Twitter sets “daily limits” on the number of direct messages that accounts without Twitter Blue can send, as part of changes to reduce spam in DMs

PCMag 2023-07-23 Michael Kan

Context & Ripple Effects

This is the next step in Twitter’s DM anti-spam rollout: it follows a plan to route messages from verified people a recipient does not follow into requests rather than the primary inbox, adding a filtering layer ahead of this sending cap.

The approach also reprises Twitter’s earlier use of activity ceilings to curb abuse, including its reduction in daily account follows. The notable change is that DM capacity is now explicitly differentiated by Blue status.

First-order effects

Accounts without Twitter Blue face a finite daily DM sending allowance, limiting high-volume outreach while Twitter seeks to reduce spam in recipients’ inboxes.
Twitter Blue gains a clearer functional distinction from unverified accounts in direct messaging, while the platform can constrain suspected abusive behavior at the action level.

Second-order effects

Legitimate unverified users who rely on many outbound DMs may need to change outreach patterns or encounter more friction, making the limit’s calibration consequential for both spam reduction and ordinary use.
The combination of inbox routing and sender limits creates two enforcement points: recipients see fewer unsolicited messages, and would-be spammers have less sending capacity before messages reach those filters.

Third-order effects

If platforms increasingly assign scarce actions such as messages to account status, anti-abuse controls may become part of product-tier design rather than purely invisible moderation.
The broader trade-off is likely to persist: tighter rate limits can suppress automated abuse, but overly broad thresholds can also restrict active legitimate users, as Threads’ own rate-limit response to spam attacks illustrated.

The trend: Social platforms are moving toward action budgets and account-based trust signals to make high-volume abuse more costly without closing messaging altogether.

Discussion

@mmasnick.bsky.social Mike Masnick on bluesky
I've spent way too long thinking about monetization questions around internet services, but one key thing to me has always been *never* create incentives for the company to make a site worse just to encourage people to pay. That's always going to lead down a bad road. [embedded…
@prkvs Phani Raj Kuchibhotla on x
this + jobs, turning in to Linkedin or what?
@tomwarren Tom Warren on x
sliding into lots of DMs is gonna cost $8 a month [image]
@autismcapital @autismcapital on x
@TwitterSupport In our opinion, this is a sales funnel to get more users verified and into Blue, not to combat spam.
@scottnover Scott Nover on x
I honestly don't think they want people to use this site.
@noturtlesoup17 @noturtlesoup17 on x
I just hit my max DMs for the day lmao [image]
@thingskatedid Kate on x
alternatively talk to me on literally any competing service
@markgurman Mark Gurman on x
The absurd amount of DM spam is a recent development. It shouldn't be on Twitter users to pay up in order to be protected from spam. That's on Twitter, the company.
@mattzeitlin Matthew Zeitlin on x
would literally consider signing up for twitter blue if there was no checkmark and my posts weren't boosted
@seyitaylor @seyitaylor on x
rip my group chats I guess?
@malwarejake Jake Williams on x
Hey Twitter, it's clear you're desperate for money. You want $8. I'll pay you $100/mo if you just remove the Nazis. And the fascists. Them too. Bonus, your advertisers might come back.
@jomiadeniran @jomiadeniran on x
“An effort to reduce spam” AKA “we can't afford to pay for servers and limiting DMs reduces server costs"[video]
@mattbinder Matt Binder on x
you can tell this is well thought out because there's no mention of what those daily DM limits will be
@justinwhang @justinwhang on x
All he had to do was ban people less
@internethippo @internethippo on x
The idle chit-chat website is finally cracking down on idle chit-chat
@brianklaas Brian Klaas on x
Musk's takeover of Twitter is going to be taught in business schools as a case study for the most efficient way to light billions of dollars of value on fire in a matter of months.
@caseyexplosion @caseyexplosion on x
Translation: “Not enough people are signing up for Twitter blue, so we're breaking core usability for the majority of people in the vain hope that some of you might join the ranks of 8$chan, we're really desperate and Elon keeps throwing chairs.”
@mosquitocapital @mosquitocapital on x
Ratelimits are a very normal and powerful tool to use against spam. But if the ratelimits are *anywhere* near low enough to affect the experience of any human user, it's pretty clear signal that you're concentrating your efforts in the wrong place
@ddsd David Olsen on x
Sounds like Twitter can't afford to pay for enough server capacity to support DMs anymore.
@maxkennerly Max Kennerly on x
The business model really is “make the site worse and hope people will pay for that.”
@win98tech @win98tech on x
Fucking hilarious that they fired everyone that could actually work on anti-bot solutions, can't hire anyone because the site is a cesspit, so the only idea they have left is to implement ineffective paywalls to everything till the site bleeds out
@snazzylabs @snazzylabs on x
@TwitterSupport I haven't paid to send messages since SMS in 2006. And I ain't about to start again.
@markgurman Mark Gurman on x
Yet another bullet point to sign up for Twitter Blue being disguised as an effort to reduce spam/bad actors. There's nothing wrong with Twitter trying to make its subscription more valuable, but there's no reason to continue being disingenuous. (Also: DMs shouldn't require $).
@amya1a @amya1a on x
@TwitterSupport It seems like messages between mutuals should be exempt. The people I made the decision to follow, and who follow me as well, are not where the spam is coming from. If you make mutuals pay $8/mo to message each other, it will look like it's more about the money th…
@edzitron Ed Zitron on x
The prophecy... [image]
@kyliebytes Kylie Robison on x
do you hear that? thats the sound of dozens of meta engineers being told to fast track building the dm feature into threads
@what46hasdone @what46hasdone on x
@TwitterSupport Can't wait until you walk this back 2 days after it goes live because you see your usage metrics crash, just like you've done with almost every other major change.
@joshtpm Josh Marshall on x
Lol, cracking down on spam by getting rid of DMs if you don't pay for twitter blue. Sounds legit.
@redgamingtech @redgamingtech on x
@TwitterSupport This is NOT a good decision. Particularly given journalism / discussion. Spam filters exist and could be improved. This is NOT a change I want to see.
@matthewkeyslive Matthew Keys on x
@TwitterSupport Just tell people the real reason why you're doing this. “Want to slide into someone's DMs? Pay us first.”
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on threads
This feature stops spam by requiring you to pay to send lots of DMs a day because everyone knows spammers can't afford $8/month.
@carnage4life Dare Obasanjo on threads
Twitter has gone from saying $8/month is meant to stop bots to basically selling it as a service for spammers. You are rate limited on the number of DMs you can send unless you pay. 🤦🏾‍♂️

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