Entering your birthday is required when creating a new Twitter account. However, many users later wish to edit or remove their birthday from their Twitter profile for privacy reasons.
Unfortunately, the platform restricts changing your birthday more than once and only allows dates that match your account creation year. This causes confusion when the birthday you entered incorrectly no longer allows updates.
This comprehensive guide explains why can’t I Change My Twitter Birthday, the reasons you may be blocked from editing it, methods to update your birthday within the limitations, and steps to maximize privacy.
Table of Contents
Why Does Twitter Require Your Birthday?
Twitter asks for your birthday when you sign up for several key reasons:
- To verify you meet the minimum age requirement of 13 years per their terms of service.
- To personalize certain features like birthday notifications and balloons.
- To better target content and advertising based on age demographics.
- To aid account recovery if you forget login credentials. Providing matching details helps confirm identity.
- To detect evasive banned users trying to create new accounts.
While adding a fake birthday is possible during initial signup, Twitter deliberately makes it hard to change later to prevent misrepresentation.
Also read: What are Impressions on Twitter? A Detailed Guide
Is Your Birthday Visible on Your Twitter Profile?
By default, no – Unlike Facebook, Twitter does not publicly display your birthday next to your name and photo on your profile. It remains private internal data.
The exceptions are:
- If you explicitly opt-in to “Show birthday on my public profile,”
- Your birthday may appear in cached preview snippets on search engines like Google and DuckDuckGo until they refresh.
- Third-party Twitter apps may access and display it.
Your birthday stays private on Twitter unless you intentionally enable the public display setting.
Why Does Twitter Only Allow Changing Birthday Once?
Twitter permits changing your birthday only once to prevent exploiting the system. Reasons for the one-edit limit include:
- Preventing attempts to misrepresent your age after initially entering an incorrect birthday.
- Blocking those under 13 from signing up again as adults after being suspended for violating age minimums.
- Stopping banned users from changing personal details to evade suspensions on new accounts.
- Limiting taking advantage of birthday perks like balloons every year with a new date.
The single birthday change allowance is frustrating but aimed at maintaining account authenticity and preventing abuse.
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Why Won’t Twitter Let Me Change My Birthday Past a Certain Year?
When trying to update your birthday after already changing it once, Twitter only allows dates before or matching the year you created your account.
So, if you joined Twitter in 2009, you can only adjust your birthday to a date in 2009 or earlier – even if that’s illogically before you were born!
This rule prevents misrepresenting your age by locking birthday edits to account creation dates since lying about your age violates Twitter’s terms. Frustratingly, it results in blocking legitimate birthday corrections.
Can Twitter Ban You for a Fake Birthday?
Yes – entering an incorrect fake birthday below the 13-year minimum age when signing up violates Twitter’s rules. If reported and confirmed, Twitter will suspend accounts created with false birthdates until the user turns 13.
But no, Twitter does not actively monitor all user birthdays for accuracy. Unless someone files a report or your age is flagged internally, entering your birthday inaccurately during initial signup is generally not penalized.
The main risk with fake birthdays is being unable to correct it later due to the change limits.
How to Change Birthday on Twitter One Time
Since Twitter only allows changing your birthday once, here are tips to update it successfully:
- On Twitter’s website, click Settings > Account > Account information > Birth date.
- Enter the accurate birth date and click Save Changes.
- If changing from under 13 to 13 or above, be sure also to update your email and phone number to avoid immediate re-suspension.
- Consider turning off the “Show birthday on my public profile” option for privacy.
- Verify the change took effect by logging out and back in or opening your account on a new device.
With this one-time opportunity, double-check that your entry is correct to avoid getting stuck with an inaccurate permanent birthday.
Also read: Can People See What You Search on Twitter? Know the Latest Privacy Hacks in 2023
How to Change Twitter Birthday After Already Changing Once
Since Twitter blocks changing your birthday more than once, you have very limited options if stuck with an incorrect birthdate:
- Appeal to Twitter support explaining why you need to change your birthday again and hope for an exception. But success rates could be much higher.
- Delete your account and sign up fresh with an accurate birthday. But you lose your followers, tweets, DMs, etc.
- Create a new account with accurate details and gradually transition audiences to it over time. The LINK option lets you manage both accounts in the Twitter app.
- Try entering your real birthday in the year/month/day format rather than Twitter’s month/day/year format to trick their system. This works for some, but not all.
- Use third-party Twitter access apps that may passively sync an edited birthday entered in your linked account rather than directly via Twitter’s restrictive interface. This is hit or miss.
All of these workarounds could be better. But the platform ultimately forces users to get their birthday right the first time and restricts fixes, so options are limited.
How to Remove Birthday From Twitter Entirely
If frustrated enough, you can request removing your birthday from Twitter:
- Go to Twitter support and select “Account Access” then “Cannot edit my birthday.”
- Explain you want to remove your birthday from your account altogether due to entering incorrect details you cannot change.
- Note this may require verifying your ID. Twitter rarely grants birthday deletions, so manage expectations accordingly.
The nuclear option of deleting your birthday may offer the clean slate you want if you cannot change it. But expect an uphill battle winning support approval.
Should You Add a Fake Birthday When Signing Up for Twitter?
We advise entering your real birthday when creating a new Twitter account for several key reasons:
- Getting caught in a lie from the start jeopardizes account standing. Twitter heavily restricts fixing incorrect details.
- With no public display, keeping your birthday accurate but private is safer than falsifying ages.
- Legal requirements for parental consent on underage accounts are serious for Twitter to uphold.
- Avoid barriers to changing your mind later if you wish to take advantage of birthday features.
While the temptation to enter a fake birthday exists, it causes more future headaches than easily entering accurate details from the start.
Also read: How to Read Comments on Twitter: A Step-by-Step Guide
Is There a Way to Hide Your Birthday on Twitter?
Unlike Facebook, Twitter lacks profile visibility options for hiding your birthday. However, you can maximize privacy by:
- Ensuring “Show birthday on my public profile” under settings is disabled. This prevents it from displaying on your profile.
- Using third-party Twitter apps like Tweetbot that do not access or display your birthday data.
- Entering an age when signing up that is 13 or above if you are an adult. This avoids flagging underage account issues.
- Not mentioning your birthday in your bio, tweets, or display name.
Aside from account deletion, Twitter does not allow fully removing or hiding birthday details from their system once entered. However, keeping the data private limits exposure.
Can You Change the Birthday on a Locked Twitter Account?
If Twitter temporarily locks your account, you may still be able to edit your birthday if you have not already changed it once before:
- Request an account access review from a locked mode, requesting birthday update access specifically.
- Twitter may allow one-time birthday changes from locked accounts on an exception basis. But expect a high rejection likelihood.
- Ensure your appeal includes verifiable ID, the reason for previous ToS violations resulting in the lock, and why you require birthday change access.
- Expect 2-3 weeks for a review response, during which your account remains locked.
While certainly not guaranteed, a well-reasoned appeal explaining your birthday edit need may get approved even from a locked state in some cases.
How to Find Someone’s Birthday on Twitter
Twitter keeps users’ birthdays private, but you can sometimes find someone’s birthday or astrological sign on their profile through:
- Looking for their birth date explicitly written in their bio description text.
- References about when their upcoming birthday is to deduce their birth month/day.
- Mentions of their Zodiac sign, correspond to different date ranges.
- Analyzing tweets around the times of year they celebrate a birthday.
- Looking for family or friends wishing them a public happy birthday on their timelines.
- Checking if they have a confirmed Wikipedia page listing their birth date accurately.
In most cases, Twitter users keep their birthdays private. But hints can occasionally help piece it together without directly asking them.
Does Twitter Notify You About Other Users’ Birthdays?
Unlike Facebook, Twitter has no native feature that proactively alerts you when people you follow have a birthday coming up. However, some extensions like Birthday Bot can add Twitter birthday notifications by:
- Scanning your feed around your connections’ birthdays for related posts.
- Matching saved birthdays from your address book with people you follow.
- Allowing you to input your followers’ birthdays to be tracked manually.
So, while you must put in some effort, third-party Twitter services can recreate the birthday notification functionality that the platform lacks.
Also read: Free Twitter Likes: The Complete Guide for 2023
Twitter Birthday FAQ
Conclusion
Changing your birthday on Twitter is purposely restrictive, often confusing users with wrong birth dates. While inconvenient, it aims to uphold account authenticity. Remember that keeping your birthday private by default limits visibility, and entering it accurately when signing up avoids future problems. Contact Twitter support if your situation requires an exception to the single birthday change policy.
