You have a week of Threads posts to queue for three clients. One caption runs long, one carousel has 22 slides and one post carries six links. Threads will refuse all three and trim nothing for you. Here are the limits Threads publishes, each with the figure and the page it came from. Everything below was checked on 4 September 2026.
| Limit | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Post text | 500 characters | Threads API overview |
| Text attachment | Up to 10,000 characters | Meta newsroom |
| Carousel | 2 to 20 photos or videos | Threads API overview |
| Links in a post | 5 or fewer | Threads API posts |
| Topic tag | 1 per post, up to 50 characters | Instagram Help Centre |
| Poll | 4 options of 25 characters, open 24 hours | Instagram Help Centre |
| Image | JPEG or PNG, 8 MB, 320 to 1440 px wide | Threads API posts |
| Video | 5 minutes, 1 GB, MOV or MP4 | Threads API posts |
| API published posts | 250 in a rolling 24 hours | Threads API overview |
| API replies | 1,000 in a rolling 24 hours | Threads API overview |
| API deletions | 100 in a rolling 24 hours | Threads API overview |
| Drafts on mobile | 100 | Threads account |
The 500 character limit and what counts towards it
The Threads API overview puts it in one line: “Text posts are limited to 500 characters.” The launch announcement said the same in July 2023, adding that posts can include links, photos and videos up to 5 minutes long. Nothing has moved since.
Emoji are the catch. The API posts page states that “emojis are counted as the number of UTF-8 bytes,” so a caption with a dozen emoji runs out sooner than the count on your screen suggests. If you publish through a tool, count in that tool and leave a few characters spare.
Write the Threads version on its own. A caption trimmed down from a longer platform reads like a caption that was trimmed. Five hundred characters is about three short paragraphs, which is room for one idea told properly.
Text attachments: up to 10,000 characters behind a 500 character post
Meta started rolling out text attachments on 4 September 2025. Its newsroom put the limit at “up to 10,000 characters of text,” and any attached text can be read directly in Threads without leaving the app. The post itself stays at 500 characters. The announcement has the detail.
That is the place for a full statement, a recipe, the terms of a giveaway or a product update that would otherwise sprawl across ten replies. The 500 characters do the hook and the attachment carries the rest. The Threads app has had attachments since September 2025 and the API changelog added them on 3 October 2025, so a scheduling tool can attach one too. Two rules from the API attachments page: an attachment goes on a text-only post, and a post cannot carry both an attachment and a poll.
Photos, videos and carousels: sizes and the 20 item cap
The API posts page lists what Threads accepts through a publishing tool. Images are JPEG or PNG, 8 MB at most, with an aspect ratio limit of 10:1 and a width between 320 and 1440 px. Video runs to 300 seconds, so 5 minutes, at 1 GB maximum, in MOV or MP4, at 23 to 60 frames per second and no wider than 1920 px. Any ratio from 0.01:1 to 10:1 is accepted, and Meta recommends 9:16.
Carousels take between 2 and 20 items. The API overview puts it as “a maximum of 20 children and a minimum of 2 children,” and Threads’ own account announced the move to 20 on 18 September 2024. A 22 slide carousel does not post. Split it into two posts, or cut it to 20.
A safe export for Threads is a portrait image 1080 px wide under 8 MB, and a 9:16 video under 5 minutes and under 1 GB. Both sit well inside every limit above.
Links, topic tags and polls
A post may hold 5 links or fewer. From 22 December 2025 a post with more fails at creation with the error THREADS_API__LINK_LIMIT_EXCEEDED, per the API posts page. Six links in a launch post means no post, so put the extra links in a reply, or in a text attachment, which the API attachments page holds to the same rule of 5 links or fewer.
Topics are Threads’ version of a hashtag, and you get one. The Instagram Help Centre says “You can include up to 1 topic per post,” up to 50 characters long, and that a topic may contain spaces and other special characters. The API posts page adds two rules for a topic set through a tool: 1 to 50 characters, and no full stops or ampersands. A topic typed into the text as a #tag is stricter still: no spaces, tabs, line breaks or punctuation such as @, commas, colons or question marks. If your topic has two words, set it as a topic rather than a #tag.
Polls hold up to 4 options of 25 characters each, and people have up to 24 hours to vote. You cannot vote in a poll you posted, and if you edit the post afterwards the poll cannot be removed or updated. The Help Centre page covers the rest. Tools can add polls too: the API changelog added them on 14 April 2025, and the API polls page allows 2 to 4 options of 1 to 25 characters on a text-only post.
Daily API caps: 250 posts, 1,000 replies, 100 deletions
Every scheduling tool publishes to Threads through Meta’s API, and the API overview caps each profile at 250 API-published posts, 1,000 replies and 100 deletions, each within a 24 hour moving period. The caps belong to the profile, not the tool. A brand posting three to five times a day never meets them. A bulk import, or a delete and repost sweep after a typo in a template, can.
The 100 deletions figure is the one to remember. Clearing a mis-scheduled batch of client posts counts against it, so check the batch before it goes rather than after. Meta also asks tools to enforce the publishing limit “especially if your app allows app users to schedule posts to be published in the future.” A scheduler that follows that advice holds you to the same 250.
Scheduling on Threads: native drafts versus a scheduler
Threads added its own scheduler on 23 January 2025. Adam Mosseri’s post reads: “You can now schedule posts on Threads, and metrics for individual posts are rolling out in Insights.” The steps, from Threads’ own post: tap the three-dot menu on the composer, tap Schedule, choose a date and time, then tap Schedule again. Scheduled posts sit in your drafts folder, where you can edit or delete them. Mobile holds up to 100 drafts.
Neither post gives a scheduling window. MacRumors reported the next day that multiple posts can be scheduled per day, up to 75 days in advance, and that replies cannot be scheduled. Treat those three points as reported, not as Meta’s wording.
The native scheduler is free and it works well for one account. If you run your own brand, use it. The Threads API posts reference lists no field for a future publish time, so a scheduling tool holds the post and sends it at the moment you set. That is worth paying for when you have several client accounts, want them on one calendar, need a client to approve a post before it goes, or post for audiences in another time zone. One account and one clock rarely needs any of that.
A checklist before you queue a week of client Threads posts
- Count to 500 in the tool that will publish, and remember emoji count as bytes.
- Anything longer goes in a text attachment of up to 10,000 characters, on a text-only post.
- Carousels hold 2 to 20 items. Images 320 to 1440 px wide and under 8 MB. Video under 5 minutes and under 1 GB.
- Five links at most. The sixth stops the post.
- One topic, 50 characters or fewer, with no full stops or ampersands. No spaces either if you type it as a #tag.
- Polls take 2 to 4 options of 25 characters, close after 24 hours and go on text-only posts.
- Stay under the caps: 250 published posts and 100 deletions per profile in any 24 hours.
- Schedule in the client’s time zone and get the approval before the slot, not after.
Threads is one of the eight platforms Ignis publishes to, alongside Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, Reddit and WhatsApp. Basic is free and covers three platforms for one client. Growth is AED 49 a month for all eight, ten seats and unlimited posts. The features page shows what each connected account can do, and the pricing page has every line of the bill.
Sources
- Threads API overview: 500 character limit, carousel 2 to 20, daily caps of 250 posts, 1,000 replies and 100 deletions.
- Threads API posts: image and video specifications, 5 link limit, topic tag rules, emoji counted as UTF-8 bytes.
- Threads API changelog: polls added 14 April 2025, text attachments added 3 October 2025, link limit enforced from 22 December 2025.
- Threads API polls: 2 to 4 options of 1 to 25 characters, text-only posts.
- Threads API text attachments: 10,000 character maximum, text-only posts, not combined with a poll.
- Meta newsroom, 4 September 2025: text attachments of up to 10,000 characters.
- Instagram announcement, July 2023: launch wording on 500 characters and 5 minute video.
- Instagram Help Centre: one topic per post, up to 50 characters.
- Instagram Help Centre: poll options, 25 character limit, 24 hour voting.
- Threads, 18 September 2024: carousels of up to 20 photos or videos.
- Threads, 23 January 2025: how to schedule a post natively.
- Adam Mosseri, 23 January 2025: scheduling and per-post metrics.
- MacRumors, 24 January 2025: reported 75 day window, multiple posts a day, no reply scheduling.
- Threads: up to 100 drafts on mobile.
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