Twitter’s ‘new product’ likely to expand 140-character tweet limit

Twitter users have big news coming their way. According to latest reports, Twitter is finally going to expand the maximum character limits for tweets.

Since its inception, Twitter had the 140-character limit set for tweets. Several users have for long desired the company to expand it and it’s also been a hot topic for discussion internally at Twitter for years.

Re/code reports that Twitter is building a new product that will allow users to share tweets that go beyond 140-character limit, according to multiple people familiar with the company’s plans. The topic resurfaced in recent months under interim CEO Jack Dorsey as the company has been exploring new ways to grow its user base. He is apparently supportive of a potential change.

The company had approximately 316 million users as of June 30, 2015 and has been trying to find ways to boost user growth.

While it is uncertain what the new product will look like, Re/code says that executives are discussing the idea of altering how Twitter determines the 140-character limit by removing things like links and user handles from the count, multiple sources say.

It also needs to be mentioned here that Twitter has already been taking steps in this direction. In April, it added a “retweet with comment” option to give people more room to comment on tweets they share and in June, it lifted the 140-character rule on private messages.

“People have been very precious at Twitter about what Twitter can be and how much it can be evolved,” one current senior employee told Re/code. “Having Jack come in and say it’s okay makes all the difference in the world.”