Twitter is limiting the number of DMs unverified users can send | Engadget

Twitter has again made its platform a little less usable for people who choose not to pay for a Blue subscription. The company has announced that it will soon implement a new rule that puts a limit on the number of DMs unverified accounts can send per day. In a tweet, Twitter said the change is part of its efforts to reduce spam in direct messages, which has seen a sharp uptick recently. 

On July 14th, the website added a new message setting that sends DMs from accounts people follow to their primary inbox and DMs from verified users they don’t follow to their message request inbox. Twitter said it saw a 70 percent reduction in spam messages a week after the new setting came out. Before that, the website limited the ability to send DMs to people who don’t follow them to Blue subscribers only. 

While Twitter said the upcoming change is meant to reduce DM spam, it’s still another move that not-so-subtly pushes unverified subscribers towards paying for Blue membership. In fact, the website’s announcement about it explicitly tells people to “subscribe today to send more messages” and includes a link to the subscription page. Twitter also previously put a strict cap on how many tweets a day a user can see, with unverified accounts being limited to 600 posts. 

Elon Musk tweeted this month that Twitter is suffering from an ongoing negative cash flow, because its advertising revenue has dropped by 50 percent. Even if money from subscriptions can’t make up for that, it’s still money in the company’s pocket.