# Twitter Search Operators That No Longer Work

Some Twitter search operators no longer return useful results: filters for shut-down services such as Periscope and Vine find nothing new, location operators find few posts, and repost filters reach back only a few days.

[![apidojo](/blog/authors/apidojo.png)**Apidojo** *15+ years of experience in data retrieval.*](/blog/authors/apidojo/)

**7 October 2026** Published

**3 min** Read

![Cover card reading 'Twitter Search Operators That No Longer Work'](/blog/covers/operators-not-working.png)

**Some Twitter search operators no longer return useful results: filters for shut-down services such as Periscope and Vine find nothing new, location operators find few posts, and repost filters reach back only a few days.** Most “broken” searches, though, are typing mistakes, such as lowercase `or`, a space after the colon, or `min_likes:` instead of `min_faves:`.

This page separates operators that are gone, operators that changed, and mistakes that only look like broken operators. The operators that work are in the [Twitter advanced search operators](/blog/twitter-search/advanced-search-operators/) reference.

## Which Twitter Search Operators Are Gone?

**Operators tied to services X shut down still parse, but they have nothing new to find.** Listed below are the operators to stop using.

| Operator | Why it no longer helps | Use instead |
| --- | --- | --- |
| filter:periscope | Periscope shut down in 2021 | filter:native_video |
| filter:vine | Vine shut down in 2017 | filter:native_video |
| :) and :( attitude searches | Sentiment search was removed from X search | Collect posts and score sentiment yourself |

Scoring sentiment on collected posts is covered in [how to collect tweets for sentiment analysis](/blog/twitter-scraping/sentiment-analysis-dataset/).

## Which Twitter Search Operators Work Differently Now?

**These operators still work, but their results changed, so searches built on old behaviour return less than expected.** Listed below are the 4 operators ([twitter-advanced-search reference](https://github.com/igorbrigadir/twitter-advanced-search)).

| Operator | What changed | Workaround |
| --- | --- | --- |
| near:, within:, geocode: | X phased out exact coordinates for ordinary posts and kept them only for photos, so few posts match | Search the place name as a keyword, or add lang: |
| filter:nativeretweets, include:nativeretweets | Return reposts from only about the last 7 to 10 days | Search the original author with from: |
| filter:verified | Verification on X changed in 2023, so the set of matching accounts changed too | filter:blue_verified for paid verification |
| Count filters above about 1,000 | min_faves: and similar counts are approximate at high numbers | Use thresholds as rough floors |

Location searches still run in apidojo’s actors when posts carry location data; the documentation includes a `near:` example ([Apify](https://apify.com/apidojo/twitter-scraper-lite)).

## Which Twitter Operators Never Worked That Way?

**Many searches fail because of operators that look plausible but were never part of X web search.** Listed below are the 6 most common mistakes.

| You typed | What happens | Correct form |
| --- | --- | --- |
| min_likes:100 | Not a web search operator | min_faves:100 |
| cats or dogs | or is searched as a word | cats OR dogs |
| from: NASA | The space breaks the operator | from:NASA |
| from:@NASA | Extra @ sign | from:NASA |
| since:2024-6-1 | Date not in YYYY-MM-DD form | since:2024-06-01 |
| cats AND dogs | AND is searched as a word | cats dogs (space means AND) |

The `min_faves:` family is covered in [how to search tweets by likes, reposts and replies](/blog/twitter-search/search-by-engagement/), and OR in [how to search multiple keywords on X with OR](/blog/twitter-search/search-multiple-keywords-or/).

## Do X API Operators Work in X Search?

**No, X API operators such as `is:retweet`, `has:links` and `is:verified` belong to the developer API, and X web search uses its own forms: `filter:retweets`, `filter:links` and `filter:verified`.** The X API’s operators are documented separately ([X API docs](https://docs.x.com/x-api/posts/search)), and the two sets are compared in the [Twitter search API guide](/blog/twitter-api/search-api/).

## How Do You Test Whether an Operator Works?

**Test an operator by searching it alone with one common word, then adding your other filters one at a time.** If `cats filter:images` returns results and your full query doesn’t, the problem is another part of the query. A single query holds about 22 operators before X stops applying them (twitter-advanced-search reference). Long queries are built step by step in [how to build complex Twitter search queries](/blog/twitter-search/complex-search-queries/).

## The scrapers behind this

-   [Twitter Scraper Unlimited Single tweets, reply threads, X Articles and small queries; no minimum $0.016 / query + $0.40 / 1K](/scrapers/twitter-scraper-lite/)

## Questions people ask

### Did X remove advanced search?

No, advanced search still works for logged-in accounts on X.com ([X Help Center](https://help.x.com/en/using-x/x-advanced-search)).

### Why does my search work on the web but not in the app?

The app's keyboard often adds a space after the colon or curly quotes; retype them.

### Do operators work when logged out?

No, sign in to use search.

## More on Twitter search operators

-   [Twitter Advanced Search Operators: Full List (2026) Every X search operator that works in 2026, with examples for accounts, dates, engagement, media and replies, plus copy-paste search recipes.](/blog/twitter-search/advanced-search-operators/)
-   [since: and until: on X: Date and Time Operators How since:, until:, since\_time:, since\_id:, max\_id: and within\_time: work on X search, including UTC times and tweet ID timestamps.](/blog/twitter-search/since-until-operators/)
-   [from: vs to: vs @username on X Search The difference between from:, to: and @username on X search, when to use each, and how to combine them to isolate conversations.](/blog/twitter-search/from-to-mention-operators/)
-   [How to Build Complex Twitter Search Queries Combine OR groups, parentheses, filters and exclusions into one X search, step by step, with 7 ready query templates.](/blog/twitter-search/complex-search-queries/)

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