This article provides:

• An overview of how Twitter uses your location information
• Answers to privacy concerns
• Answers to FAQs about tweeting with your location

Tweeting with your location allows you to selectively add location information to your Tweets. This feature is off by default and you will need to opt-in to use it.

If you're wondering how to Tweet with your location, please see our How to Tweet With Your Location and How To Use the Location Feature on Mobile Devices articles.

Allowing Twitter to use your location

Once you've opted-into this feature, Twitter will be able to:

• Show your followers the location you are tweeting from as part of your Tweet. You can control this setting on a per-Tweet basis. (Note: Some third-party applications will let you tweet with your exact address or coordinates.)
• Enable delivery of location-specific trends and stories, that are personalized for your location, when accessing Twitter via a mobile device. Learn more.

For example, here's a Tweet from @SchauerTime that was posted from the Castro neighborhood in San Francisco:

Even after you enable Tweet Location in your settings, you have additional control over which Tweets (and what type of location information) is shared. The FAQ below has more information about how locations are displayed in your Tweets.

Your privacy and Tweeting with your location

We want you to have control over how and when your location information is shared. With this in mind:

• Tweet Location is off by default, and as a user you need to opt-in to the service
• You can turn Tweet Location on or off at any time, or clear your location before you Tweet
• You can delete all of your past location data with a single click (see How to Tweet With Your Location for step-by-step instructions)
• Be cautious and careful about the amount of information you share online. There may be some updates where you want to share your location ("The parade is starting now." or "A truck just spilled delicious candy all over the roadway!"), and some updates where you want to keep your location private. Just like you might not want to tweet your home address, please be cautious in tweeting coordinates you don't want others to see.
• Remember that when you're opted in to Tweet Location, you can still choose not to share your location for individual Tweets, or choose a more general location level if your application allows
• Please familiarize yourself with our general location settings and the settings of any applications and devices you tweet with so that you are always aware of the information you share
• Remember, once you post something online, it’s out there for others to see

Location feature FAQ

What location information is displayed?

• All geolocation information begins as a location (latitude and longitude), sent from your browser or device
• Twitter won't show any location information unless you've opted-in to the feature, and have allowed your device or browser to transmit your coordinates to us
• For each Tweet, we will publicly display whatever location information you've elected to share. For example, if you update from Twitter mobile and have specified that a particular Tweet should show your neighborhood, these coordinates can be seen on Twitter.com, Twitter mobile, and in third party applications.
• Application developers are required to be up-front and obvious about whether your exact coordinates, or just the place, will be displayed. When you tweet from a third party application or mobile device, it should be clear which type of data will be publicly displayed.

Why do I see a pin-pointed exact location for some Tweets, but only the general vicinity (neighborhood or city) for others?

• The default display is place location (like neighborhood or town), but some third party apps let you Tweet with your exact location or address
• For example, this Tweet only shows a place (San Francisco, CA):

• If you select your exact location to be displayed through a third party app, the actual coordinates can be publicly shared
• In the Tweet below, you'll see a pin icon in the Tweet, indicating that it's geotagged. Location information is displayed underneath the text of the Tweet, along with an exact point marker in the map below the Tweet:

What location information does Twitter store?

• Twitter stores the location information that is publicly displayed with a Tweet for as long as the Tweet exists (or until you click the Clear my location history button on the Settings page as described here). This is similar to how we store the time stamp that says when the Tweet was made.
• If you chose to tweet with a place, but not to share your exact coordinates, Twitter still uses and stores your coordinates to determine your place, and will temporarily store those coordinates for 6 months
• This helps improve the accuracy of our geolocation systems (for example, the way we define neighborhoods and places)

Which browsers support tweeting with location?

• Firefox 3.5 and up
• Google Chrome
• To use this feature on Twitter.com with other browsers (older versions of Firefox and Internet Explorer), you’ll need to download Google Gears.

Why does Twitter display where I used to live or work rather than my current location?

• Some services, such as Google, Skyhook Wireless, and others generate a database of WiFi signals mapped to locations. If you move and take your wireless router with you, these services may not have the up-to-date information and will still associate your WiFi signal with your old address.
• Firefox and browsers using Google Gears access these sorts of databases to guess your location, and then pass this guess on to Twitter. This means that if your location was never updated in the database, then Twitter will guess the wrong location for you.
• If you are experiencing this problem and need to update your location, please click here (Google Users) or here (Skyhook Wireless Users).

What about international users?

We're working on rolling Tweet Location features out to other countries as fast as we can!

Still need help? Contact Support.