Twitter has officially culled the 140 character limit in its Direct Messaging service. The move, announced in an official blog post, means that DMs take on far more of an instant messaging role than they did previously.
According to Twitter product manager Sachin Agarwal, the update was made because “each of the hundreds of millions of Tweets sent across Twitter every day is an opportunity for you to spark a conversation about what’s happening in your world”.
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“Today’s change is another big step towards making the private side of Twitter even more powerful and fun,” he adds.
The removal of the character limit is just the latest in a series of changes Twitter’s made to the feature. Earlier this year, it began allowing users to send DMs to anyone, even if they didn’t follow each other. Prior to that, it rolled out the option of sending group DMs.
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According to Agarwal, the update won’t affect the public-facing side of Twitter at all. “Tweets will continue to be the 140 characters they are today, rich with commentary as well as photos, videos, links, Vines, gifs, and emoji,” he writes.
The update has already started rolling out on Twitter’s Android and iOS apps, twitter.com, TweetDeck, and Twitter for Mac. According to Twitter, it will continue to roll out worldwide over the next few weeks.
The social media network also notes that sending and receiving Direct Messages via SMS will still be limited.
