How to use Twitter’s new mute button

TORONTO – This one goes out to anyone who has ever had their Twitter timeline clogged with Internet trolls, or chatty friends.

Twitter has rolled out a new feature that will allow you to temporarily (or indefinitely, if you choose) mute someone you follow.

“Muting” a user means you won’t be able to see their tweets or retweets in your timeline and you won’t receive push notifications on your device from that user.

“The muted user will still be able to favorite, reply to and retweet your Tweets; you just won’t see any of that activity in your timeline,” said Twitter product manager Paul Rosania in a blog post.

You are probably thinking, “Wouldn’t I just unfollow someone that annoyed me that much?”

Yes, you could. But the mute function allows you to mute and unmute a user at any time, which could come in quite handy if you are following someone who decides to start live-tweeting an event you have no interest in, or – cue the horror music – decides to live tweet the season finale of that show you are missing.

READ MORE: Are anti-social apps the new social craze?

Twitter won’t notify the user that you have muted them either, so your followers will be none the wiser.

Users can turn the mute function – which will be rolled out to all users in the coming weeks – on and off using the iOS, Android and desktop versions of Twitter.

Desktop

To mute a user directly from a tweet, click on the “More” button at the bottom of the tweet and then select “Mute.”

Or, you can mute a user directly from their profile by clicking on the gear icon at the top right hand side of their profile and select “Mute” from the list of actions.

Once you have muted a user you will see a red mute icon on their profile – if you decide you want to see their tweets again, all you have to do is click that icon to unmute them.

iOS App

Android App