Despite Twitter retiring its old verification system, many users still want to know who is legacy verified and who is paying for verification with Twitter Blue. But the company has made that more difficult to do by changing its verified profile information.
If knowing who’s paying for the verified checkmark is important to you, there are still a few workarounds you can try.
Twitter Stops Showing Who Is Legacy Verified Versus Who Has Twitter Blue
Previously, when you clicked on the blue checkmark of a verified account, a description would tell you whether it was legacy verified or verified through Twitter Blue.
For legacy verified accounts, the description said: “This is a legacy verified account. It may or may not be notable”.
Meanwhile, Twitter Blue accounts had a description that said: “This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue”.
Twitter had announced plans to remove legacy checkmarks from April 1, 2023. But instead, the site seems to have focused on changing the description for verified accounts. It now reads: “This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue or is a legacy verified account.”
So far, the only legacy verified account that seems to have lost its checkmark is The New York Times. In a now-deleted tweet captured by Matt Binder, Musk said that Twitter would give legacy verified users “a few weeks grace”. There’s an exception though: if they say they won’t pay for Twitter Blue (as is the case with The New York Times). According to the deleted tweet, this would lead to Twitter removing an account’s checkmark.
How to Tell Who Subscribes to Twitter Blue
So with this change, can you still tell who paid for Twitter Blue verification? There are two main workarounds: using custom search filters or using a browser extension.
Custom Search Filters for Twitter Blue
You can use Twitter’s own search filters with specific terms to find out who has a Twitter Blue subscription. This method is mostly accurate, but may bring up a few non-verified accounts. It’s possible that these are accounts that used to have Twitter Blue but no longer have an active subscription.
The custom search filter was shared by Ketan Joshi in November 2022. To use it, paste the following into your Twitter search bar:
filter:follows -filter:verified filter:blue_verified
This will show you which accounts you follow have Twitter Blue verification. If you want to do a general search of Twitter Blue verified users, you can remove the follow filter and use:
-filter:verified filter:blue_verified
Using the Eight Dollars Extension to See Paid Twitter Users
You can use the Eight Dollars browser extension to identify paid verification on Twitter without having to use search filters. Once installed, this extension will include a Paid badge for Twitter Blue accounts, and a Verified badge for legacy verified accounts.
To use the Eight Dollars extension, visit the extension’s Github page and follow the link for your relevant browser. It is available on Chrome, Brave, Firefox, Edge, and Opera.
How to Find Legacy Verified Accounts
What if you want to keep track of legacy verified accounts? Well, you can tweak Ketan Joti’s custom filter to do this.
To identify legacy verified accounts that you follow, paste this into your Twitter search bar:
filter:follows filter:verified -filter:blue_verified
To identify legacy verified accounts in a general Twitter search, use this instead:
filter:verified -filter:blue_verified
You Can Still Tell Who’s Subscribed to Twitter Blue
Despite Twitter removing the front-end differentiation between Twitter Blue and legacy verified accounts, you can still figure out which is which. Whether these methods remain, however, will depend on if Twitter finds a way to block them.
