A few days ago, Twitter announced in its blog a major change to its 140 characters limit. The microblog, born as a simple messaging tool, has become richer and richer in its content - through GIF, video, Periscope transmission and survey implementation: these will all be removed from the standard count of the social network.

Here’s what is going to change:

Replies
When replying to a Tweet, @names will no longer count toward the 140-character count. A useful solution to make having group conversations easier. This change will only affect user’s names that appears when someone gets a reply, and it won’t work for those typed manually to mention a user.

Photo, Video, GIF
To make words stand out, all media attachments - photos, videos, GIFs, surveys, Periscope transmissions and quote tweets - will not count as characters. 

Retweet and Quote Tweets
Twitter will enable the Retweet yourself feature to post again a reflection in case the user thinks that a really good one went unnoticed.

.@
Tweets that will start with a username will all be seen to a user’s followers and not only to those who follow the mentioned user.There will be no need to use a character (the most common solution is to use a point) before the @ of the username. Retweeting a reply will make it visible to the followers.

However, links will still count towards the current 140 characters, which are the most annoying because of their length.

It’s an essential change, but that’s not all. Todd Sherman, Twitter Senior Product Manager, mentioned additional changes: “In addition to the changes outlined above, we have plans to help you get even more from your Tweets. We’re exploring ways to make existing uses easier and enable new ones, all without compromising the unique brevity and speed that make Twitter the best place for live commentary, connections, and conversations.”

Source: Twitter's Blog