Elon Musk Claims Twitter Users Posted ‘20,000 Tweets Per Second’: Is Platform Truly Growing?

Twitter users posted 20,000 tweets per second, claimed Elon Musk. He boasted the platform successfully handled the surge in user activity and appreciated Twitter employees for managing the "record usage". There were rumors about Twitter collapsing after the micro-blogging network laid off half of its employees, and several high-ranking officials resigned. However, Twitter is still here, and Musk claims the platform is thriving. But the platform is no stranger to such peaks.

Twitter Users Put Up 20,000 Tweets Per Second, Claims Musk

Twitter CEO Elon Musk posted a tweet claiming Twitter witnessed frenzied activity. He appreciated Twitter employees for ensuring the platform performed reliably under pressure.

World Cup traffic hit almost 20,000 tweets per second today! Great work by Twitter team managing record usage.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 23, 2022

Elon Musk attributed the surge in user activity to the ongoing football world cup. The FIFA World Cup 2022 is being held in the Qatar Peninsula. Musk's tweet mentioned "World Cup", but it is obvious that he was referring to the ongoing football championship.

In a separate tweet, Musk appreciated Twitter employees who are currently working "hardcore" at the micro-blogging network. He said, "To be fair, there are many people at Twitter working late into the night, for whom I have great respect."

To be fair, there are many people at Twitter working late into the night, for whom I have great respect

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 23, 2022

Are Twitter Employees Overburdened?

The two tweets from Elon Musk seem to imply that Twitter employees are working exceptionally hard. After all, Twitter did lose lost half of its workforce in the last week. Twitter was even trying to rehire some employees it fired "by mistake". However, the platform has witnessed such a surge quite a few times in the past.

Twitter, as a platform, was reliably handing 200 million daily active users with a staff strength of just 1000. In fact, Twitter handled more than 25,000 tweets per second way back in 2011. Incidentally, this was years before the software system and content networks were as efficient as they are today.

In 2013, the screening of an anime film, Castle in the Sky, led to a new record of more than 143,000 tweets per second. https://t.co/j2kGY8XuKa

— Ryan Mac 🙃 (@RMac18) November 23, 2022

The platform even welcomed 143,000 tweets per second back in 2013. Needless to say, Twitter has grown significantly in the past decade, and hence, 20,000 tweets per second, isn't a big number.

Incidentally, a video from Project Veritas has some alleged Twitter employees saying they worked less than 4 hours daily. This suggests Twitter had way more employees on its payroll than it needed. Hence, it is possible Elon Musk may have removed a lot of fluff from Twitter.