There are a lot of Twitter plugins and widgets out there for WordPress. So which one is the best? I’ve tested a lot of the various plugins available, but I have yet to find a plugin that has the functionality of Twitter Tools by Alex King. This plugin does an great job of providing both enough options and clean code. I also trust Alex because he’s a core contributor to WordPress, which means more than likely not leaving WordPress anytime soon.
So what’s so great about Twitter Tools? Here are just a few items I love about this plugin:
- The plugin comes loaded with 4 different widget plugins you can activate, for whatever suits you best.
- You can setup weekly digest posts to recap from what was talked about on Twitter
- Optionally you can create individual posts for each tweet
- You can optionally tweet directly from your sidebar (which is great when you want to let people tweet from your account, but not give them access directly)
- You can choose which Javascript library to use
- A linkback is optional and not forced (which some plugins do, and makes me quite angry when they do)
Overall, this plugin is just a great plugin. Alex keeps it up to date, so you can rest assured that it’s a secure plugin.
Here is what the options page looks like.
I used Twitter Tools for a while and then I swapped it with Twitter Posts (http://www.rene-ade.de/inhalte/wordpress-plugin-twitterposts.html). The main advantage I found of using that one that everything goes automatically and without having to change the code, you can change the text that shows up in Twitter to announce you have a new post…
uhuh, in your screenshot I can see now that Twitter Tools also has that option, hmmm….
I agree Jonathan. I love Twitter Tools. I use it on a couple of different sites, for very different purposes. Very flexible. And the word “optional” comes with every feature. It’s like a “make-your-own” twitter plugin.
I’ve been using this plugin for a while now and have been extremely happy with it. Of course, not every Twitter plugin will work 100% of the time, but I’ve seen this one as the most reliable.
Agreed. I have not found a Twitter plugin better than Twitter Tools. Although recently I stopped using a plugin and just use javascript to display my tweets. And my weekly digest is done manually every week, so I can categorize everything and make it a little more useful.
posting tweets with Twitter Tools has worked perfect till a few days back.. Now the URL is missing from the Tweets.
Could it be that the latest version of Wordpress is interfering with it?
I see no place to enter the Title or URL in customization. What else could it be?
No, the upgrade wouldn’t have messed with it — the only changes for WordPress 2.8.6 were a few security fixes, dealing with user registration.
I’m not sure what you mean by “enter the Title or URL in customization” — if you want to tweet directly using Twitter Tools, there are options to auto-tweet your new posts.
i agreed w/ u, this plugin is best-of-the-best twitter plugin ever.
already tried fews, nothing can beat TT.
just awesome!
Thanks for the twitter plugin links