Twitter expands downvote test to global audience

Twitter, which has been testing the downvote option since last year, announced that it has expanded the test to global users.

The downvote option, initially given to a select group of web users, will soon expand to iOS and Android users, Twitter said. Unlike sites like Reddit, the total numbers of upvotes and downvotes will not be publicly visible.

We've been testing how we can surface the most relevant replies within Tweets with the use of downvoting on replies. As we're expanding the experiment to a global audience, we want to share a little about what we have learned thus far!
👇 https://t.co/wM0CpwRgo6

— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) February 3, 2022

Twitter said, a majority of users shared that the reason they clicked the down arrow was either because the reply was perceived as offensive, or because they perceived it as not relevant, or both. 

“This experiment also revealed that downvoting is the most frequently used way for people to flag content they don’t want to see,” the company added.