Twitter Appears to Be Beta Testing a Lightning Tipping Feature

Thomas M

Sep 01, 2021 - 1 min read

Twitter appears to be testing a new feature in beta that has bitcoiners excited.

A screenshot picturing what looks like a Twitter beta interface emerged on social media on Wednesday, showing instructions on how to use the Lightning Network to receive tips; a report by MacRumors mentions that "code in the beta suggests that Twitter is in the process of rolling [the feature] out."

The new feature looks to be a tip jar enabled by Lightning transactions. The Lightning Network is Bitcoin's most popular second layer that enables near-instant peer-to-peer payments at negligible fees. Lightning has seen a surge in adoption recently, with the network's capacity sitting at around 2,350 bitcoin at the time of writing.

It is not confirmed whether the image is real or not; the Lightning payment function itself is currently not available on the Twitter beta, according to MacRumors. The new payment option may become part of Twitter's Tip Jar feature, which the company rolled out among a test group earlier this year.

For the Lightning tipping function, Twitter reportedly seeks to use Strike, meaning users will be required to open a Strike account to receive tips.

If implemented, the feature could bring Lightning transactions to Twitter's more than 200 million monetizable daily active users.

While reports of the new feature have not been confirmed by official sources, bitcoiners likely wouldn't be surprised to see Lightning make it into the app; Twitter CEO has long been a vocal Bitcoin and Lightning Network advocate.