Twitter renames Latest Tweets to Following and Home to For You, making the algorithmic feed the default with no option to change it, rolling out on iOS first
Twitter is changing how you move between the algorithmically-driven timeline and the reverse chronological one and making the algorithmic feed the default.
The VergeMitchell Clark
Context & Ripple Effects
Twitter had spent years preserving a chronological alternative: its 2018 update enabled a return to chronological posts, and a 2022 iOS redesign let users swipe between feeds without making Latest the default. The company also rolled back a prior iOS timeline change after complaints, showing that feed selection had already become a sensitive product decision.
Today’s relabeling turns that choice into a clearer split between a recommendation-led "For You" feed and a following-based timeline, while initially removing users’ ability to set the latter as their default. The stance was short-lived: Twitter’s web product soon began remembering the timeline a user last chose, ahead of the same change on mobile.
First-order effects
iOS users open Twitter into the algorithmic For You timeline and must manually switch to Following when they want reverse-chronological posts.
Twitter makes its recommendation system the primary route to attention on iOS, while recasting the chronological option as a secondary Following view.
Second-order effects
Accounts and publishers seeking reach face a more algorithm-mediated distribution path on iOS, rather than relying primarily on when they post.
The earlier rollback and the later last-used-timeline policy put pressure on Twitter to balance algorithmic discovery with user control over feed defaults.
Third-order effects
Feed defaults become a central lever in Twitter’s platform governance: the interface determines whether attention is allocated chiefly by ranking systems or by a user’s explicit follow graph.
The sequence points to an unstable equilibrium between recommendation-first design and chronological choice, with user response shaping how durable mandatory defaults can be.
The trend: Social platforms are making algorithmic recommendation feeds the front door while retaining chronological views as a contested user-control feature.
See the Tweets you want to see. Starting today on iOS, swipe between tabs to see Tweets recommended “For you” or Tweets from the accounts you're “Following.”
The “For you” and “Following” tabs replace “Home” and “Latest” and will be pinned to the top of your timeline so you can easily switch between them. Swipe to switch timelines instead of tapping the ✨ icon.
👍 for this change. Toggling between “top” and latest tweets was inconvenient. Swiping is much better — it's easy to go back and forth https://twitter.com/...
No thanks. There's a reason why people follow other people around here - because they care what they have to say. The algorithmic feed flips that on its head. I've always switched back to chronological. Twitter not allowing that is going to piss me off. https://www.theverge.com/.…
The slow extinction of the reverse chronological timeline. The rise of “recommended” posts being the default people see on opening. It started when Facebook decided to copy TikTok's For You page https://twitter.com/...
Well this is grim. No longer can you choose between the two views and Twitter will remember that preference every app session. The default is ‘for you’, and while it'll remember a ‘following’ preference if you leave the app, quitting it resets it to ‘for you’. I hate it. https://…
if you ever need to explain what “institutional knowledge” is, a good example would be that literally any of the people elon musk fired could've told him that they tried this already—several times!—and no one liked it https://twitter.com/...
lmao twitter updated and now my timeline is defaulted to recommended instead of chronological and it can't be turned off. have to swipe right every time. fucking hell
Here we go. Twitter seem to have added two tabs to your feed. ‘Following’ is your normal chronological one and ‘For you’ is the Twitter algorithm deciding what you should see. Except even if you select ‘Following’, Twitter keeps automatically flipping you to ‘For you’ as default …
Told you. This redesign is rolling out right now, and users report that Twitter always opens to the “for you” algorithmic timeline a la TikTok. If you want to see content from the people you follow, you have to click the “following” tab every time you open Twitter. https://twitte…
The passive aggressive nature of the “For You” feed is amazing. “Yes, yes, you've carefully followed a select set of accounts and, sure, you *think* that's what you want to see here, but we at Twitter dot Musk know you better than you do, so shut up and read this crap.” https://t…
twitter updated, why the fuck wouldn't you have people you're actually following show up first instead of the bullshit “for you” recommended dogpiss that no one wants, elon fuck, you've struck gold again, you absolute shithead https://twitter.com/...
Some people are overplaying this change. For You is the old Home and Following (formerly Latest) got easier to access. Twitter used to always shift people back to Home even when they used the stars to switch to Latest. Now you just have to swipe. https://www.theverge.com/...