Standard v1.1 compared to Twitter API v2

If you have been working with the v1.1 statuses/sample endpoint, the goal of this guide is to help you understand the similarities and differences between the standard and Twitter API v2 sample stream endpoints.

• Differences
  • Endpoint URLs
  • App and Project requirements
  • Authentication method
  • Response data format
  • Request parameters
  • Availability of recovery and redundancy features

Differences

Endpoint URLs

• Standard v1.1 endpoints:

  • https://stream.twitter.com/1.1/statuses/sample

• Twitter API v2 endpoint:

  • https://api.twitter.com/2/tweets/sample/stream

App and Project requirements

The Twitter API v2 endpoints require that you use credentials from a developer App that is associated to a Project when authenticating your requests. All Twitter API v1.1 endpoints can use credentials from standalone Apps or Apps associated with a project. 
 

Authentication method

The standard endpoint supports OAuth 1.0a User Context, whereas the new Twitter API v2 sample stream endpoint supports OAuth 2.0 Bearer Token (also referred to as Application-only authentication). To make requests to the Twitter API v2 version you must use a Bearer Token to authenticate your requests.

You can easily obtain a Bearer Token on navigating to your app's “Keys and tokens” page on the developer portal. If you’d like to generate a Bearer Token, see this OAuth 2.0 Bearer Token guide. 
 

Response data format

One of the biggest differences between standard v1.1 and Twitter API v2 endpoint versions is how you select which fields return in your payload.

For the standard endpoints, you receive many of the response fields by default, and then have the option to use parameters to identify which fields or sets of fields should return in the payload.

The Twitter API v2 version only delivers the Tweet id and text fields by default. To request any additional fields or objects, you wil need to use the fields and expansions parameters. Any Tweet fields that you request from these endpoints will return in the primary Tweet object. Any expanded user, media, poll, or place objects and fields will return in an includes object within your response. You can then match any expanded objects back to the Tweet object by matching the IDs located in both the Tweet and the expanded object. 

We encourage you to read more about these new parameters in their respective guides, or by reading our guide on how to use fields and expansions. 

We have also put together a data format migration guide which can help you map standard v1.1 fields to the newer v2 fields. This guide will also provide you the specific expansion and field parameter that you will need to pass with your v2 request to return specific fields. 
 

In addition to the changes in how you request certain fields, Twitter API v2 is also introducing new JSON designs for the objects returned by the APIs, including Tweet and user objects.

• At the JSON root level, the standard endpoints return Tweet objects in a statuses array, while Twitter API v2 returns a data array. 
• Instead of referring to Retweeted and Quoted "statuses", Twitter API v2 JSON refers to Retweeted and Quoted Tweets. Many legacy and deprecated fields, such as contributors and user.translator_type are being removed. 
• Instead of using both favorites (in Tweet object) and favourites (in user object), Twitter API v2 uses the term like. 
• Twitter is adopting the convention that JSON values with no value (for example, null) are not written to the payload. Tweet and user attributes are only included if they have a non-null values. 
   

We also introduced a new set of fields to the Tweet object including the following:

• A conversation_id field
• Two new annotations fields, including context and entities
• Several new metrics fields 
• A new reply_setting field, which shows you who can reply to a given Tweet

Request parameters

There is also a set of standard v1.1 request parameters not supported in Twitter API v2:

Availability of recovery and redundancy features

The Twitter API v2 version of sampled stream introduces recovery and redundancy features that can help you maximize streaming up-time as well as recover any Tweets that might have been missed due to a disconnection that lasted five minutes or less.

Redundant connections allows you to connect to a given stream up to two times, which can help ensure that you maintain a connection to the stream at all times, even if one of your connections fails. 

The backfill_minutes parameter can be used to recover up to five minutes of missed data. 

Both of these features are only available to those that have been approved for Academic Research access. You can learn more about this functionality via our recovery and redundancy features integration guide.