Twitter to launch long-awaited edit feature 

San Francisco: Twitter has confirmed that it is working on an edit button that would allow users to change tweets after they have been posted, in the coming months. 

It comes after, Tesla boss Elon Musk joined the social media company's board, who asked his followers in a Twitter poll whether they wanted the feature or not. 

Musk began polling Twitter users about an edit button after disclosing his 9.2% stake in the company on Monday. As of 6.30pm EST, the poll had more than 4.2 million votes, with 73.5% supporting the feature.

Do you want an edit button?

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 5, 2022

Many users have long called for an edit button but there are concerns about how to execute it.

Jay Sullivan, Twitter's head of consumer products, said in a tweet the company had been working since last year on building an edit option, "the most requested Twitter feature for many years".

The social media firm's communications team tweeted: "Now that everyone is asking… yes, we've been working on an edit feature since last year!

"No, we didn't get the idea from a poll," it added.

Sullivan tweeted the feature will take time to fine tune as "without things like time limits, controls, and transparency about what has been edited, Edit could be misused to alter the record of the public conversation".

Twitter will start testing the feature within its Twitter Blue Labs premium subscription service in the coming months to "learn what works, what doesn't, and what's possible," it said.

Twitter Blue members get exclusive access to premium features and app customizations for a monthly subscription.

1/ We’ve been exploring how to build an Edit feature in a safe manner since last year and plan to begin testing it within @TwitterBlue Labs in the coming months. Sharing a few more insights on how we’re thinking about Edit 🧵 https://t.co/WbcfkUue8e

— Jay Sullivan (@jaysullivan) April 5, 2022

The update, first teased by Twitter last week (on April 1), saying it was exploring an edit button but it was widely interpreted as an April Fool's joke.

Twitter Chief Executive Officer Parag Agrawal asked users to "vote carefully" on Monday, though the company on Tuesday tweeted that it did not get the idea for the edit button from the poll.

Under an edit function users would be able to fix typos or errors in a tweet without losing any replies, retweets or likes.