Is Twitter banning third-party apps like Twitterific and Tweetbot

According to a report published by The Information, Twitter may have banned third-party apps from accessing its Application Program Interface (API). Apps like Echofon, Twitterific, Tweetbot and Fenix all rely on this access for gathering data and present it to their users. This suspension has been labeled an “intentional suspension” by The Information. However, the reason for the same has not been revealed yet. It may be to ensure people only use Twitter and not third-party apps. 

We’re aware that Twitterrific is having problems communicating with Twitter. We don’t yet know what the root cause is, but we’re trying to find out. Please stay tuned and apologies.

— Twitterrific (@Twitterrific) January 13, 2023

“Tweetbot and other clients are experiencing problems logging in to Twitter. We’ve reached out to Twitter for more details, but haven’t heard back,” wrote Tapbots on January 13. The accounts of other third-party applications have also posted similar tweets. 

Developers express angst on other websites

We are aware of the connection issues, which also seem to impact other Twitter clients. We are working hard to discover and resolve the issue. Twitter has not yet replied. Thank you for your patience.

— echofon (@echofon) January 13, 2023

Upon noticing these issues, developers turned to Mastodon to talk about the same. “Did Twitter just kill 3rd party clients? Can’t login with Twitterific at the moment, wrote Twitterrific’s Sean Heber.

Similarly, Tweetbot’s Paul Haddad also said “I’m hoping that whatever is going on at Twitter is just some automated spam protection bot that is incorrectly suspending proper apps.”

What has Twitter said about banning third-party apps? 

Twitter has not released any official statements as of now. However, a month ago, the company did say that it would “invest in our Developer Platform, especially our Twitter API,”. They also added a note saying “Thank you for sticking with us through this transition, and we cannot wait to keep building together”.