How to use Twitter on the move

Getting started with Twitter on your iPhone or Android smartphone is easy. Find out how with our quick 5-step guide…

Download Twitter's app and get tweeting

If you’ve managed to avoid Twitter so far but fancy discovering what all the fuss is about, the good news is you can get set up and start sending your own “Tweets” in minutes.

It’s a free and open system that uses an @username tag similar to an email address, making it easy to post messages and catch up with anyone on Twitter.

Sending @twitter messages from your computer is simply a case of going online at www.twitter.com, but we’re going to look at using Twitter on the go from your smartphone.

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Get the app

First of all you need to add the Twitter app to your phone. If you have an Android device search for Twitter in the Google Play store, or search the App Store if you use an iPhone. The official app is available free from Twitter Inc.

2. Sign up

Next, you’ll need to create a Twitter account. This can be done on your phone through the Twitter app’s settings menu, or you can sign up from your computer by visiting www.twitter.com. Just choose a Twitter username and password to start the account.

3. Set up

If you created your account through the Twitter app then you’re all set to send and receive Tweets. If you joined through a browser on your computer just add the account details to the Twitter app on your phone.

4. Your first Tweet

Click the top-right ‘write message’ button. Tweets are limited to 140 characters, which doesn’t sound like a lot but it’s enough for most messages. Why not send a message to Twitter to test things out? Type “Hi @Twitter this is my first message!”

5. Follow and be followed

If you search for people’s Twitter names you can then choose to “follow” them, which means you’ll be sent any messages they post. Friends and family are obvious candidates to follow, but you can also look for famous celebs – for example, @stephenfry is a popular chap to follow. People can choose to follow you too.

Twitter lingo

Add images to your tweets too!

@username

Add this to a message to have it posted and sent to that person or organisation. In the same way other people and groups can send you a tweet by including your @twittername. Use more than one to send it to multiple people.

#hashtags

You’ll often see messages include the # (hash) symbol before a word. These are like keywords that can be searched for or used to mark a special event or group.

Retweet or RT

If you like something someone has posted you can “retweet” it. This reposts their tweet on your stream but refers back to the original poster.

Shorturl

Most web addresses are very long so often you’ll see seemingly garbled links, these are called shorturls and often use a third-party site to expand them to their full address. Twitter has an automatic shorturl t.co, but others include bitly and TinyURL.

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