There are many types of social media management tools. The most useful X (formerly Twitter) management tool is a client or dashboard. It is designed to replace X's one-column display of tweets with more powerful ways to read, send, and manage tweets.

One difference between the various X client and dashboard programs is whether they require a software download and installation on your computer, or whether they run through an Internet browser and require no downloads. Additionally, some X client tools allow you to manage other social media networks and services.

X is making more and more changes to its site to make it more useful. However, the X homepage is not as powerful as the best independent X clients mentioned in this article.

X Pro (formerly TweetDeck) was so popular that Twitter acquired it in May 2011 and continues to develop it as an X client. TweetDeck was originally free, but you have to pay for a subscription to X Pro.