How to Schedule Tweets (+ Free Twitter Character Counter)

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When you’re juggling multiple tasks, your Twitter marketing efforts often end up taking the backstage. As a result, other aspects of your business may suffer because you’re not attracting and engaging with your audience on Twitter. So you may be looking for solutions to help you make your job easier and maintain a strong Twitter presence such as scheduling your Tweets.

Being able to schedule your Tweets is an easy way to manage your tasks more efficiently and ensure that you’re consistently posting on Twitter. In this post, we’ll take a look at how you can schedule your Tweets. Plus, you’ll also get a free post calculator tool to make sure that your scheduled Tweets don’t exceed Twitter’s maximum character limit. Let’s get started.


 How to Schedule Tweets:


Why Schedule Tweets?

Now you may be wondering why you should schedule your Tweets in the first place. Can’t you just craft your Tweets and send them out right away? While that’s a perfectly reasonable option, here are a few reasons why you should consider scheduling Tweets.

Helps with Content Planning

Being able to schedule your Tweets means you can easily plan ahead for an entire week, month, or even year. This means you can be strategic about your Twitter content-whether you want to craft occasion-specific Tweets or you want to create highly engaging Tweets for an upcoming campaign. You can also schedule your Tweets based on the publishing frequency that works for you. 

As a result, your Twitter publishing efforts also become more organized. Plus, you get to sit back and relax or focus on other important tasks while your Tweets are scheduled to go out at the designated time. You won’t have to manually publish them as they automatically get sent according to your content plan.

Easier to Maintain Posting Consistency

When you don’t have to manually publish your posts, it’s easier to maintain posting consistency. That means you won’t accidentally forget to post when you’re supposed to because your Tweets will automatically go out at the prescribed time without you having to lift a finger. 

You can schedule your Tweets to get published at specific times based on your desired posting frequency-whether it’s once, twice, or even thrice a day. This allows you to consistently post throughout the day or week even if you’re juggling multiple tasks or you’re away on vacation. 

Publish at Optimal Times

With conversations on Twitter moving at such a fast pace, timing is everything. You have to be sure to publish your Tweets at a time when your followers are most likely to see them. This improves your chances of visibility and engagement, which can subsequently help you improve your Twitter performance. 

Scheduling your Tweets means you can target those optimal post timings to ensure better Tweet visibility. You can schedule your Tweets to go out at a time when your followers are most active, which will improve the likelihood that they’ll see and engage with your posts.


How to Schedule Tweets Using the Twitter Scheduler

The native Twitter scheduler is the easiest way to schedule your Tweets. While you can use third-party social media scheduling tools, the native scheduler is a free and easy solution if you don’t already use one. Follow the steps below to schedule Tweets using the native Twitter scheduler.


Step

Click on the blue compose button from the left-hand panel of your Twitter homepage. This will open up the compose window where you can start crafting your Tweet. Alternatively, you can also click on the Tweet composer at the top of the page to start creating your Tweet.

Twitter homepage


Step

Start creating your Tweet. At this step, make sure you’re including any necessary images, videos, and hashtags. You can even include polls that would engage your followers with interesting questions or help you gauge their preferences. 


Step

Click on the Schedule button at the bottom of the compose window. This looks like a calendar icon with a timer. 

Schedule button Twitter


Step

Now select the date and time you want the Tweet to go out. You can get really precise with your selection, with the option to choose the hour and minute for your scheduled Tweet. Twitter will automatically set the schedule according to your time zone so make sure to account for any time zone differences during scheduling. 


Step

Hit “Confirm” and you’re all set. You now have your Tweet scheduled to go out automatically at a designated time. You can also click on the “Scheduled Tweets” option at the bottom of the scheduler to review your scheduled Tweets. 

“Scheduled Tweets”


Scheduling Tweets Using Third-Party Tools

The native Twitter scheduler is a free and easy solution for those who need to schedule just a handful of Tweets per week. However, it has its limitations. For instance, it doesn’t offer a visual content calendar that will allow you to visualize your content plan and easily make adjustments. Moreover, it’s only limited to Twitter, which means you’ll still need to use a separate tool to schedule your posts for another social media platform.

This is why it usually makes sense to use a third-party social media scheduling tool to manage all your socials in one place. These tools typically come with a visual content calendar that allows you to get a big-picture overview of your content plan. This makes it easy to adjust your scheduled posts to maintain the ideal posting frequency and diversify your posts between different content formats. Some of the best third-party Twitter scheduler tools include:

1. Loomly

Loomly is a brand management platform that allows you to plan and schedule your organic and paid social media posts. It provides you with a consistent stream of content ideas through RSS feeds and trending Twitter topics. It also simplifies content planning by letting you store all your assets in one place.

Loomly Calendar

Source: loomly.com

The tool lets you schedule your Tweets to go out automatically at a time that works best for you. You can also set up approval workflows and add comments to make sure that everyone’s on board before you schedule your posts. 

Loomly
4.5 out of 5 stars
This cloud-based marketing solution works best for freelancers, influencers and social media managers looking to best manage content on social media platforms.
Ratings
Features & Pricing
Pros and Cons
Ratings
Features
4.1
Ease of Use
4.6
Support
4.7
Overall Score
4.5
Features & Pricing
Analytics
Automated Publishing
Contact Management
Customer Targeting
Keyword Filtering
Multi-Account Management
Post Scheduling
Customer Engagement
Multi-User Collaboration
Reporting/Analytics
Price starting at:$26
Pros and Cons
Intuitive management tool
Inexpensive
Easy to learn platform
Requires additional integrations for some social publishing
Too many bots may bother users
Calendar function may be hard to access
Best for: Agencies, freelancers, startups, non profit organizations, influencers & individuals
Loomly
4.5 out of 5 stars
This cloud-based marketing solution works best for freelancers, influencers and social media managers looking to best manage content on social media platforms.

2. Agorapulse

This lets you schedule up to 40 Tweets per month for free. You can also upgrade to a paid plan to access more features. It comes with a visual content calendar to help you get a big-picture overview of your content schedule. You can also easily collaborate with team members by sharing notes and feedback.

AgoraPulse provides you with suggestions for the best time and day to publish your Tweets. It also allows you to schedule your Tweets in bulk so you can plan ahead months in advance. 

Agorapulse
4.5 out of 5 stars
Agorapulse is a social media management platform stocked full of features for individuals, businesses, and enterprises. Their added listening tool helps users monitor brand mentions. Features include a variety of ways to publish content, reporting, analytics, and more.
Ratings
Features & Pricing
Pros and Cons
Ratings
Features
4.0
Ease of Use
4.6
Support
4.8
Overall Score
4.5
Features & Pricing
Analytics
Automated Publishing
Contact Management
Content Management
Conversion Tracking
Keyword Filtering
Multi-Account Management
Post Scheduling
Reporting/Analytics
Social Media Monitoring
Competitive Analysis
Scheduling
Social Media Calendar
Social Media Management
Team Workflow & Collaboration
Social Media Listening
Price starting at:$49
Pros and Cons
Easy social media management
Simple platform
Makes it easy not to double reply etc
Lack of post editing features
Limited third party integrations
Engagement platform can be difficult to use
Best for: Mid-sized agencies, mid-sized businesses and some enterprise brands.
Agorapulse
4.5 out of 5 stars
Agorapulse is a social media management platform stocked full of features for individuals, businesses, and enterprises. Their added listening tool helps users monitor brand mentions. Features include a variety of ways to publish content, reporting, analytics, and more.

3. CoSchedule

CoSchedule is a marketing calendar tool that allows you to manage all your marketing efforts in one place. The visual content calendar helps you plan your marketing tasks and your social media posts. From here, you can collaborate with team members, share feedback, and make updates in real-time.

With the CoSchedule social media scheduler, you can create and schedule an unlimited number of social messages. You can even upload your Tweets in bulk with a CSV file upload. CoSchedule also lets you create a social sharing template to reuse multiple times instead of having to manually create your content schedule from scratch. 

CoSchedule
4.4 out of 5 stars
Plan, organize, and execute all your content marketing tasks in one place with CoSchedule. This all-in-one platform has drag-and-drop calendars to make it easy to collaborate with co-workers and schedule all projects in the same place.
Ratings
Features & Pricing
Pros and Cons
Ratings
Features
4.8
Ease of Use
4.2
Support
4.3
Overall Score
4.4
Features & Pricing
Analytics
Automated Publishing
Content Management
Multi-Account Management
Post Scheduling
Customer Engagement
Multi-User Collaboration
Reporting/Analytics
Social Media Monitoring
Price starting at:$29
Pros and Cons
Centralized dashboard and calendar
Easy collaboration for teams and clients
Project management tools
Multiple features
Noncompetitive pricing
Not enough customization options
Slow loading
Best for: Professional marketers, marketing teams, and marketing agencies
CoSchedule
4.4 out of 5 stars
Plan, organize, and execute all your content marketing tasks in one place with CoSchedule. This all-in-one platform has drag-and-drop calendars to make it easy to collaborate with co-workers and schedule all projects in the same place.

4. Sprout Social

Sprout Social is a comprehensive social media management platform that offers robust scheduling features. You can use the visual content calendar to plan your Tweets and strategically adjust your schedule for optimal results. This calendar also lets you visualize your content plan across all major social networks, allowing you to streamline the entire planning process.

To make sure that you’re reaching your audience at the right time, Sprout Social also provides you with smart suggestions on optimal post times. This means you can schedule your posts to go out at a time when your audience is most likely to engage with your posts.

Sprout Social
4.4 out of 5 stars
Sprout Social is a popular social media management platform that offers schedule, analytics and engagement tools. Manage your social media from one place with their all-in-one platform and get insights to understand your audience and your KPIs. Data-driven ingiths help businesses improve responsiveness.
Ratings
Features & Pricing
Pros and Cons
Ratings
Features
4.5
Ease of Use
4.4
Support
4.3
Overall Score
4.4
Features & Pricing
Analytics
Automated Publishing
Contact Management
Content Management
Conversion Tracking
Customer Targeting
Keyword Filtering
Multi-Account Management
Post Scheduling
Brand Tracking
Reporting/Analytics
Social Media Monitoring
Price starting at:$249
Pros and Cons
Easy to navigate interface
User-friendly publishing calendar
Robust reporting
Competitive analysis features
Expensive price tag
Support can be slow
Lack of native support for some social networks
Best for: Brands and organizations of all sizes
Sprout Social
4.4 out of 5 stars
Sprout Social is a popular social media management platform that offers schedule, analytics and engagement tools. Manage your social media from one place with their all-in-one platform and get insights to understand your audience and your KPIs. Data-driven ingiths help businesses improve responsiveness.

5. SocialPilot

SocialPilot offers comprehensive tools to create and publish posts for major social media channels. You can use it to customize and schedule your Tweets to go out at a time that works best for you. This means adding GIFs, tags, images, and videos right on the platform. You can also get a macro view of your content strategy through a Social Calendar that helps you visualize your entire schedule.

If you’re managing multiple Twitter accounts or if you have a highly demanding posting schedule, you’ll love the bulk scheduling feature. SocialPilot allows you to schedule up to 500 posts in bulk at one go, which helps you to save time. 

SocialPilot
4.5 out of 5 stars
SocialPilot centralizes your social media management to help improve efficiency. The tool features an automated post schedule, easy integration with Canva, marketing tools, and other unique features to propel your social strategy.
Ratings
Features & Pricing
Pros and Cons
Ratings
Features
4.1
Ease of Use
4.7
Support
4.7
Overall Score
4.5
Features & Pricing
Analytics
Automated Publishing
Content Management
Conversion Tracking
Multi-Account Management
Post Scheduling
Price starting at:$25.50
Pros and Cons
Excellent value for money
Canva integration makes creating beautiful posts simple
Easy-to-navigate dashboard
No automated TikTok posting
Lacks advanced features that would attract large businesses and enterprises
Doesn’t offer a lot of third-party apps or integrations
Best for: Digital marketing agencies and SMBs
SocialPilot
4.5 out of 5 stars
SocialPilot centralizes your social media management to help improve efficiency. The tool features an automated post schedule, easy integration with Canva, marketing tools, and other unique features to propel your social strategy.

Can You Schedule Tweets in Bulk?

When you’re managing multiple Twitter accounts or your content strategy demands hundreds of Tweets in a month, you may have a hard time manually scheduling your Tweets one at a time. Fortunately, there are plenty of third-party tools that allow you to schedule your Tweets in bulk. Depending on the tool and the plan you have, you’ll be able to upload hundreds of Tweets at one go in a CSV file and easily then schedule each of them to go out at an assigned time.


Best Practices for Scheduling Tweets

Now that you know some of the options you have to schedule your Tweets, you’re all set to start planning your Twitter content strategy. However, make sure you’re following the best practices below to take a strategic approach to content scheduling.

Find the Best Time to Tweet

The best time to post on Twitter largely depends on when your audience is most active. This may vary by industry, time zone, and even your brand specifically. You could test different times to see what works best for you. Additionally, some scheduling tools even provide you with smart suggestions on the best time to post based on previous post performances. 

It’s crucial that you post at these optimal times to make sure that your audience is seeing your Tweets and engaging with them. Otherwise, you’ll simply be sending out your Tweets only to have no one see them. 

Perfect Your Posting Frequency

Frequency is another factor to consider when planning your Twitter content strategy. This, just like your post timing, is largely subjective. Posting a single Tweet a day may be well and great for some, whereas others may need to consistently send out multiple Tweets every day in order to get noticed and engage their audience. 

As such, make sure you’re testing out different posting frequencies to see what works best for you. Consider if there are any changes in performance based on the number of times you post in a day. This will help you find the perfect posting frequency so you can build your scheduling blueprint to further simplify your Twitter content planning.

Proactively Make Adjustments

While you may have an entire year’s worth of Tweets laid out, there may be unexpected events that could affect the appropriateness and timeliness of your content. For example, if an unprecedented tragedy occurs, you may need to put your scheduled Tweets on pause and craft a timely message to acknowledge the event. This will help show your audience that you’re sensitive to the current situation and help you connect with them better. 

Be proactive so you can quickly make adjustments to your scheduled content plan. Otherwise, you may come across as an insensitive and unfeeling brand that doesn’t really care about what’s happening around them. 


Free Post Calculator Tool

Write or paste your text into this online character counter:

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With Twitter having such strict restrictions on the number of characters you can include in your Tweet, it’s crucial that your scheduled Tweets are also within the limit set by Twitter. Otherwise, you could end up having to deal with tons of Tweets that couldn’t be sent on time because of character restrictions.

When crafting Tweets to schedule, use our free social media character counter to make sure that your post doesn’t exceed the Twitter character limit. This allows you to plan ahead more accurately and streamline your content scheduling efforts.

Frequently Asked Questions

How can I schedule Tweets for free?

Twitter offers a native scheduler that lets you schedule Tweets for free. You can also find a few third-party scheduling apps that let you schedule a limited number of Tweets for free. 

How do I schedule a Tweet on mobile?

You can schedule a Tweet on mobile by accessing the website from your phone browser. Alternatively, you can also use third-party scheduling apps that come with mobile scheduling functionality. 

How do I plan a Tweet in advance?

You can plan a Tweet in advance by clicking on the calendar icon in the compose window and selecting the date and time that you want your Tweet to go out. 

How do you automate a Tweet?

You can automate a Tweet by setting a schedule for it to go out at a predetermined time.

Where can I find scheduled Tweets?

You can find your scheduled Tweets by clicking on the “Scheduled Tweets” button on your Twitter scheduler.