After some rough recent years, Twitter decided to make the service more accessible by doubling the character count

Twitter has had a bad period in the recent years. Both monthly user and revenue growth have struggled and eventually turned into declines. As a result, stocks are down more than 60% over the past five years.

Some of the investors put the blame on the slow execution, and also on failing to build a product that appeals to a larger audience. Whatever the reasons, the company said that it is making a “big move” that it hopes will make the service more usable and appealing: doubling the character count.

“Trying to cram your thoughts into a Tweet — we’ve all been there, and it’s a pain,” Twitter said in its announcement

Even so, it is worth mentioning that despite years of frustration coming from its users, the company has stubbornly stuck with its 140-character limit so far.

On the other hand, Twitter has previously tried making additional room in its 140-limit by changing what counts as a character. For example, two years ago, they made a change that no longer counted @names in replies and media attachments. However, it was considered a disappointment.

Now, Twitter is considering testing a double character count of 280: “We want every person around the world to easily express themselves on Twitter,” the company said, “so we’re doing something new: We’re going to try out a longer limit, 280 characters.”

Source: fool.com