X Kills Its Mac App, Accidentally Bans You for Switching to the iPad Version
The death of Twitter, the brand name and not the website, was apparently not quite as final as we all once thought. It might have seemed like the final nail in the coffin was the permanent redirect from Twitter.com to X.com, but one forgotten legacy Twitter product was carrying on the fight—the old Twitter app for Mac, which was still available in the Mac App Store. Well, that is, until now. Musk's X developers have finally pulled the plug. The old Twitter Mac app has been discontinued, and now prompts users to "upgrade" to the X Mac for iPad instead.
This is definitely not an upgrade. Sure, it comes with all the modern X features, including AI features and other Premium options, but it also loses what made Twitter fun in the "good old days". The Mac app was so old that it was exempt from all the ads, promotions, and community notes stuffing X today. This provided a safe haven from scams and outright weird/political ads.
But even if you prefer modern X to old-school Twitter, the iPad X app also only works on Apple laptops with Apple Silicon chips, meaning M1 chips or higher. This leaves a huge population of older Intel laptops out in the dust. If you're using an older Mac, you'll need to use the website. And if you want to reduce the number of ads, you'll have to pay for Twitter Premium.
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But the trouble doesn't stop there. At least for now, it's not a good idea to use the iPad X app on Mac. Users on Reddit have reported that upgrading to the new X app and logging in instantly suspended their accounts. This will hopefully be resolved soon, as X software engineer Zach Warunek said that the team was looking into the issue.
If you're a Twitter diehard who's not willing to swap to X, it might be finally time to ditch X for Mastadon or Threads. On your way out, don't forget to delete your X account.
The old Twitter Mac app, despite being outdated, offered a tech advantage with its ad-free experience. Unfortunately, with its discontinuation, tech-savvy users seeking an ad-free Twitter experience on their Intel Macs now have to resort to using the Twitter website or pay for Twitter Premium for the same privilege. On the other hand, Twitter users attempting to upgrade to the X Mac for iPad app have encountered account suspension issues reported on Reddit.
