mstdn.social is one of the many independent Mastodon servers you can use to participate in the fediverse.
A general-purpose Mastodon server with a 500 character limit. All languages are welcome.

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active users

What is the maximum number of characters allowed in a Mastodon post? I’ve noticed some posts are quite long but I tried a long post and found I had exceeded the character count after a short paragraph.

@RiBurton Different instances have different length settings. It's something to consider if you ever think of changing instances.

@sbourne as you can see, I’m new here & feel really dumb. What is an instance?

@RiBurton I could try to explain, but it sounds like you need @feditips! Everything I know I learned from there (and the website they link to on their account page.)

FediTips has moved!

@sbourne @RiBurton

Hey there Mr Burton!

I run a website at fedi.tips which is full of info for beginners.

An instance is just another name for a server. It means the server or site you signed up on. In your case, your server is mastodon.social.

There are thousands of servers on here, all independent, and they sometimes offer different features to their users. Some of them offer much larger character limits.

You can move your account if you want to change servers.

fedi.tipsFedi.Tips – An Unofficial Guide to Mastodon and the Fediverse
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@sbourne @RiBurton

p.s. You don't have to be on the same server as others. The servers connect together to form a single network, very much like the telephone system.

When you make a phone call, you don't need to think about whether the person on the other end uses a different provider, because all the phone providers are connected. This place is like that, but for social media.