How to Make X Show Only Your Following Feed

X already has the feed you want. It's right there, one tab across from the one you get. Following shows posts from accounts you chose to follow, in order, with no algorithmic recommendations. Then you close the app, reopen it, and you're back in For You.

Why the Following tab won't stay put

For You is where X puts recommended posts, promoted posts, and accounts you don't follow. It's the surface the business depends on, so it's the one the app opens to. Tab persistence on X's iOS app has changed several times over the years and has never been a documented, reliable setting you can rely on.

So you pay a small tax every session. Notice you're in the wrong feed, swipe across, start again. Most people stop bothering after a while. That's rather the point.

Getting a Following feed that stays

Unspiral opens X's mobile site and enforces the Following feed on your device every time the page loads. Of the five sites Unspiral supports, X has the most opinionated defaults. All four of its controls ship on:

• Following only. The timeline is your follows, not recommendations.
• Hide trends and suggestions. No Trending sidebar, no Who to follow.
• Hide ad posts. Promoted posts are removed from the timeline.
• Count posts seen. A running count of how many posts you've scrolled past today, which resets at midnight.

1. Open X from the Home tab

   Tap X in Unspiral and sign in on X's own web page if you want your timeline. Unspiral doesn't receive your X credentials.

   

2. Check the controls under Settings

   Open Settings → Website Controls → X. You should see 4 of 4 modifications on. Turn any of them off if you want some of X's recommendations back. The defaults are a starting point, not a lock.

   

The alternatives, honestly

Just swiping to Following each time

Free and immediate. It also does nothing about promoted posts, Trending, or Who to follow, which all live inside the Following tab anyway. And you'll do it every single session.

Lists as a replacement timeline

A pinned X List gives you a chronological, recommendation-free timeline of accounts you choose, and lists do generally stay where you put them. This is a genuinely good option and costs nothing. The catch is curation: you're maintaining the list by hand, and it's separate from your actual follows, so new follows don't appear until you add them.

Screen Time limits

Settings → Screen Time → App Limits caps how long you spend in X. Useful as a boundary, but it treats the app as one thing. It can't give you the Following feed while withholding For You.

What you give up

X's mobile website covers posting, replies, DMs, search, profiles, and notifications, but it's not the native app. Some newer features arrive in the app first, and a few media and creator workflows are app-only. Keeping the native X app installed for those, while doing everyday reading through the website, is a perfectly reasonable split.