In India, the service is available for a monthly fee of Rs 650 on the web and Rs 900 on mobile devices. The microblogging platform also offers a discounted annual plan of Rs 6,800 per year, which comes to Rs 566.67 per month.
The Twitter Blue rollout is in line with its chief executive officer Elon Musk‘s drive to push for monetisation on the platform.
Musk had previously suggested he would set the price of the subscription service taking into consideration the region that it was being rolled out in but that doesn’t appear to be the case.
Twitter Blue’s monthly cost is higher than Netflix, Spotify, Apple Music and several other global services which are generally available for cheaper in such markets to factor in the nations’ low GDPs.
Under Musk, Twitter Blue gives users access to additional features such as the blue check mark and the ability to edit a tweet, post longer videos, organise bookmarks, customise the app icon and put an Non-fungible token (NFT) as the profile picture.
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In November last year, Twitter Blue subscription was rolled out in geographies including India before being pausing due to the mushrooming of fake accounts.
ETtechA screengrab of how Twitter Blue appears on mobile devices
At that time, it was introduced for iOS users and had been priced at Rs 719 which was more expensive than the pricing of the feature in the US.
In the US, the Twitter Blue subscription was available at $7.99 (approx Rs 645). The Rs 719 Twitter Blue pricing in India came as a surprise then as the Tesla CEO had said that pricing would be adjusted in countries based on purchasing power.
Harish Bijoor, founder, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc., had told ET at the time that Indians would not be willing to pay Rs. 719 for the blue checkmark. “India is a price-centric and economy-oriented market, and is very cautious about every rupee spent,” he told ET then.
With the latest pricing being Rs 900 for mobile devices, most likely to offset the 15-30% commission that the app stores charge, some experts felt the pricing would make people steer clear of signing up for Twitter Blue.
What are the features?
Twitter Blue comes with an array of features from, which includes the coveted blue tick. Anyone subscribing to Twitter Blue gets the blue tick next to their username on the website. A subscription to Twitter Blue will also allow the user to edit their tweets, up to five times in a 30 minute window.
According to the information provided by Twitter, the Blue subscription will also let the users post longer and high resolution videos of up to 1080p. Subscribers will also get priority access to Twitter’s new features.
The list of features also includes 50% less ads for subscribers and priority on replies, search and mentions. Though these features are tagged as ‘Coming Soon’ on the website.
India, Brazil and Indonesia are the third, fourth and fifth biggest markets respectively, for Twitter, with over 60 million monthly active users (MAUs) on an average across the three countries.
