X (Twitter) Character Counter

How X counts characters

According to X's developer documentation, checked on 15 October 2026, X weighs every character before adding them up, so a post's count on X can differ from its plain length. A standard post holds 280 of these weighted characters:

1. Every link counts as 23 characters, however long it is, because X shortens every link with its t.co service.
2. Every emoji counts as 2 characters, including an emoji with a skin tone or several emoji joined into one, such as a family.
3. Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters count as 2, so a post in those scripts holds 140 of them.
4. X's open-source counting library counts most letters from Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Hebrew, Arabic and Devanagari scripts, digits, spaces and line breaks as 1.
5. It counts a few common symbols as 2, such as the bullet •, the ellipsis … and the euro sign €. Vietnamese letters such as ạ and ế count as 2 as well.
6. Before it counts, X turns letters typed as two parts, such as an “e” with a separate accent, into one letter, so “café” counts as 4 however it was typed.

This counter checks posts only, not a display name, a bio or a direct message.

Plain length vs X's count: five examples

The plain length your browser reports and X's count can part ways as soon as a post has a link, an emoji or Chinese, Japanese or Korean text. Here are both counts for the same pieces of text:

So that link and the family emoji cost 25 of a post's 280 characters on X, while their plain length adds up to 101. The counter shows X's weighted count, not the plain length.

How long can a post be with X Premium?

As of October 2026, a post with X Premium can hold up to 25,000 characters. According to X's help page on Premium, every Premium tier, Basic included, can write these longer posts, and anyone on X can read them.

X's guide to posting gives 25,000 for x.com but 4,000 in its iOS and Android steps, so if you post from the app, check what it accepts before you write past 4,000.

Turn on the “X Premium (up to 25,000)” switch and the counter measures your post against 25,000 instead of 280. X doesn't say whether those 25,000 are weighted like the 280, so the counter weighs them the same way: links 23, emoji 2.

X's guide to Premium features also says longer posts can't be scheduled yet. X's page on types of posts says only the accounts you mention in the first 280 characters of a longer post get a notification, so put mentions near the start.

What happens when a post is too long

X won't publish a standard post over 280 characters. Under “Where it gets cut”, the counter strikes through the part past the limit, so you can see which words to cut. Three ways to make the post fit:

1. Get to the point in the opening line and drop words the reader doesn't need.
2. Replace a long passage with a link to the full text: the link costs 23 characters whatever it holds.
3. Split the text into a thread of several posts, each 280 characters or fewer.

When the text fits, “Copy text” copies it exactly as you typed it, ready to paste into X.

What doesn't count toward the 280 characters

Images and videos you attach in X's own apps count as 0 characters. When you reply, the mention X fills in at the start of your reply doesn't count; a mention you type yourself does. Hashtags count like any other text, the “#” included.

How accurate is this counter?

This counter is built on the configuration of twitter-text, X's open-source counting library, and tested against its 24 published test cases for X's current counting rules. It finds links by that library's rules and matches 106 of the 108 link-extraction cases the library publishes. The 23 characters cover only the web address, so an emoji or Chinese, Japanese or Korean text right next to a link still counts on its own.

The main simplification: X's library checks every link, with or without https, against its full list of domain endings in public use, and this counter does not carry that list. So a link typed without https, such as scripe.io/blog, counts as a link here only when its domain has a common ending like .com, .io or .de. A link with https and a made-up ending, such as .zz, counts 23 here but character by character on X. IP addresses and private endings such as .local or .internal stay plain text, as on X.

Check the same post for LinkedIn and other networks

If you post the same text on other networks, the social media character counter checks it against LinkedIn, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon and more at once. The LinkedIn character counter counts a LinkedIn post, comment, headline or About section, and the Instagram character counter a caption or bio.

Scripe makes these counters. Scripe is a social media management platform for B2B teams and agencies, built LinkedIn-first. Today it publishes to LinkedIn, not to X.