Twitter blocks Tweetbot, and other popular third-party apps

Rapid changes have hit microblogging site Twitter during the past several weeks, ever since Elon Musk took control of the firm. On Thursday, Tweetbot and other third-party Twitter clients mysteriously stopped working. It turned out to be an intentional decision as per reports by The Information.  

Weetbot and Twitterrific, two popular third-party clients, are apparently no longer allowed by Twitter. These apps were widely used among users because of their non-algorithmic display of tweets, which we developed on Twitter API. It appears that Twitter has blocked access to the API. 

On Thursday evening, users began reporting that third-party applications were responding with Twitter API-related error messages. In addition to Twitter's own official Android, iOS, and macOS applications, no third-party apps are working at the moment. This includes Twitterrific, Fenix, Talon, and many more. Tweetdeck, luckily, is unaffected by the API downtime, but Tweetbot is not so lucky. 

Tweetbot and other clients are experiencing problems logging in to Twitter. We’ve reached out to Twitter for more details, but haven’t heard back.

We’re hoping this is just a temporary glitch and will let you know more as soon as we know more.

— Tweetbot by Tapbots (@tweetbot) January 13, 2023

Since becoming the Twitter CEO, Musk has made some significant modifications to the most popular microblogging platform in the world. Neither Twitter nor Musk have made any public statements about this latest development. 

Not just the users of the third-party applications are left uninformed but also the developers these platforms are in the dark. Some third-party Twitter clients, including Tapbots, which has been around for more than a decade, are intending to expand their services to include more microblogging sites, such as Mastodon. 

Though neither Musk nor his team has officially announced it, a leaked message from an internal Slack channel acquired by, The Information, suggests that the popular third-party Twitter client Tweet Bot has been blocked from using the Twitter API. Some users may still be able to use the third-party clients like Albatross and Fenix despite Twitter's apparent prohibition on these programs. 

In terms of third-party Twitter applications, Tweetbot by Tapbots is a heavy hitter. It's a paid client for Twitter that adds functionality not found in Twitter's official app, such as the ability to see numerous timelines at once, advanced filtering options, a customised user interface, widgets, picture-in-picture video, and more. 

There has been no official word from Twitter as to whether this is a momentary glitch or a deliberate move.