Nitter alternative for 2026: five ways to keep up with X accounts

The best Nitter alternative depends on what you used Nitter for: AyeWatch if you want new posts from X accounts and searches sent to you with no X login, a feed generator if you live in an RSS reader, and a paid API if you are building software. Nitter itself is no longer a safe bet in November 2026, because X Corp. has demanded that its instances come down and the project's code is now archived.

What happened to Nitter

Nitter was a free, open source front-end for X. It let people read public profiles without JavaScript, ads or an account, and many instances offered RSS feeds. On 24 August 2026, X Corp. sent cease and desist letters asking for a permanent takedown of Nitter instances and of the code repository, and a second letter arrived on 8 September. The maintainer's notice on nitter.net, dated 10 October, says the project has no legal counsel and is seeking funding and legal help. GitHub marks the repository as archived and read-only since 9 October 2026.

Nitter alternatives at a glance

1. AyeWatch: the pick for following accounts

AyeWatch covers the most common Nitter habit: checking a handful of accounts without signing in to X. Paste a profile link, type a search, or add an X Community, and AyeWatch tells you what is new. You never log in to X, you need no API key, and the account cannot see that you are watching. Add a plain-English rule such as "only posts about pricing or outages" and its AI drops the posts that do not match.

Alerts land in the AyeWatch feed and as push notifications on web, iOS and Android. Paid plans add email, Slack, Discord, webhooks and a REST API. It reads public posts only: protected accounts, DMs, likes and follower counts are out of reach.

2. RSS.app: when you need a real feed

RSS.app turns a public X profile, hashtag or search URL into an RSS feed that any reader can open. The free plan covers two feeds refreshed once a day, and paid plans add more feeds and faster refreshes.

3. Apify: scraping you control

Apify's store lists ready-made X scrapers, such as Tweet Scraper V2, which charge per result on top of the platform plan. It suits teams that want raw data on a schedule and can live with scrapers that need fixing when X changes.

4. twitterapi.io: cheap bulk data

twitterapi.io is an unofficial, third-party API for public X data. It bills per result returned, with a small minimum per request, and new accounts get a little free credit. It is not affiliated with X Corp., so weigh that before building on it.

5. X's official API

X's own API is pay per use: you buy credits in the Developer Console and each post read costs $0.005. It is the compliant route, but the bill grows with volume and you write the alerting yourself.

When Nitter-style reading still wins

If you want to scroll whole timelines and threads in a browser, AyeWatch is the wrong tool, because it sends new posts and is not an X reader. For that, the honest options are X itself with an account, or a self-hosted Nitter that you maintain at your own risk.

Which one to pick

For most former Nitter users the job was simple: tell me when these accounts post. Try AyeWatch's free preview, then move to a paid plan if you want email or Slack delivery. Pick RSS.app if your day runs through a feed reader, and an API if you are building a product.