Tracking the number of Twitter mentions (in thousands) over time of each major candidate in the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Click on the candidate’s name to add/remove their mention figures to the chart.

Methodology

The number of mentions is extrapolated from an approximately 1% real time sample of all tweets provided by Twitter’s streaming API. Mentions include retweets and replies and are only counted when the tweets include the candidate’s full name (case insensitive) or Twitter handle(s).

The all time chart presents data on a daily basis. The last 24 hours chart presents data collected in five-minute intervals. Data has been collected since January 31, 2019.

Disclaimer

Mention figures are approximate and are not U.S.-exclusive. Mention volume should not be interpreted as being synonymous with candidate popularity. High volumes may indicate significant controversies, inauthentic interference (e.g. from bot networks), or simply greater candidate name recognition.

The literature on whether candidate popularity on Twitter can be used as a predictor for election performance is still underdeveloped. Some scholars believe in a positive correlation.

If you have any suggestions as to how I can improve the tool or questions on how it was built, feel free to reach out. My contact information is on my website.