Earlier this year, Twitter began testing the ability to let users hide replies to their tweets, allowing users to have more control over the conversations they generate. Now, the social network has announced that, after a few months of testing with select users, the feature is available for everyone.
Hiding replies lets users prevent conversations from getting derailed, be it by going off-topic or by generating hateful or otherwise negative discussions. Hidden tweets aren't visible at first glance, but users can still choose to see them by tapping the gray icon next to a hidden tweet. This ability may 
raise concerns that users, particularly organizations or political pages, can skew messages and conversations in their favor, but Twitter says that hasn't been happening much during the testing period.
Twitter shared some more statistics, such as the fact that 85% of people hiding replies avoid using the block and mute features. Additionally, in Canada, 27% of users who had their replies hidden said that they would consider changing how they interact with others. Twitter is also considering feedback from people who might be scared to hide replies due to fear of retaliation in some way, but it didn't announce anything specific to address that.
For now, the ability to hide replies is available to everyone using the Twitter app for Android or iOS, as well as the Twitter website, which is also the Progressive Web App for the platform.
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