Twitter is now going to tell you why a topic is trending

Twitter is going to bring more context to its trending tweets so as people don’t have to ask - “Why is this trending?”Tw

Trends on Twitter show what everyone is talking about, but like is the case when you join a conversation late, not all users are aware why something is being talked about in the first place. (Twitter)

“Why is this trending?” seems to be one of the most pertinent questions on the platform. In fact, Twitter has mentioned that this phrase was tweeted over half a million times over the last one year. Trends on Twitter show what everyone is talking about, but like is the case when you join a conversation late, not all users are aware why something is being talked about in the first place.

To understand the context, users usually have to scroll through a whole lot of tweets to figure out where the trend started from and what it is. “It should be easier to understand what's being said immediately,” Twitter wrote in a blog post. 

No more having to scroll through Tweets to find out why something's trending.

Starting today, some trends on Android and iOS will show a Tweet that gives context right away. More on Trend improvements: https://t.co/qiGeL9Kg31 pic.twitter.com/Y9nilckl8B

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) September 1, 2020

The platform added that they have been working on adding more context on what's happening with labels on tweets and accounts as well as on Twitter Moments and related articles on trends. Now, they are adding pinned tweets and descriptions on trends to help users understand why something is trending.

From now on, some trends will have a Representative Tweet pinned on them to give you more insight about it, Twitter explained in the blog. The platform's curation team is going to use a combination of algorithms to determine if a tweet represents a trend by evaluating if it is reflective of the trend and popular.

“Our algorithms are designed to identify representative Tweets that aren't potentially abusive, spam, or posted by accounts trying to take advantage of our system,” Twitter added.

These Representative Tweets on trends is available for Twitter on iOS and Android now and it will be rolling out to Twitter on web soon. If you don't spot it on your Twitter app, you need to make sure it's updated.

“In the coming weeks, you should see brief descriptions added to some trends as well to help add context to the trend. Descriptions will provide straightforward, clearly sourced context around why something is trending,” the blog explains.

Representative Tweets and descriptions on trends are available in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Egypt, France, India, Ireland, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States.

“To bring more clarity to the conversation, we hope to add more context to more trends over time. To be clear, we know there is more work to do to improve trends and the context updates we're announcing today are just a small step in the right direction. There is more we can do to help people understand why something is trending and to provide transparency around how something trends. We need to make trends better and we will,” the platform added.

Ironically, just a few hours after this was announced, tweets for Trends and Search faced a glitch and were not loading. The issue was addressed and fixed within minutes.