Twitter’s hearts turn out to be more popular than the stars

Changing stars to hearts might seem like one of Twitter‘s most controversial decisions yet, but the change is actually a lot more popular than you may think — at lest, according to Twitter.

Speaking at the Open Mobil Summit conference is San Francisco Tuesday, Twitter’s product chief Kevin Weil said the company has already seen increased engagement since making the change last week.

“If you look today, we see now 6% more hearts, 6% more likes on Twitter than we saw on Favorites,” Weil said. “If you think about the size and scale of Twitter, last week there were a lotof favorites and moving that number by 6% is huge. If you look at new users, the number is even greater, we see new users engaging 9% more with this change.”

Echoing earlier comments form the company, Weil said the heart is easier to understand and makes Twitter more accessible to more people.[related-posts]

“The heart is a very universal symbol it’s a much more inclusive symbol. There’s only a few things that are your favorites but you can like lots of things. People just understand it better.”

Though power users will likely remain unconvinced by the hearts, Weil said the change was just one way the company was thinking about how to make Twitter easier to understand for more people. He noted that other new features like Moments have helped bridge what he described as the “gap between brand awareness and usage.”

Weil’s comments suggest the heart is here to stay (unlike the blue dot in Moments, which Twitter finally changed after a similar outcry.) For those who really can’t stand the new “Likes,” however, there is a Chrome extension that can bring them back when you’re on Twitter’s website.

[Mashable]