How do you get the numeric user IDs of a few thousand X accounts without typing every handle into a lookup box? Skip the lookup box and go to a file that already holds the numbers: one CSV of an account's followers carries the ID of every person in it.
What this guide gives you.A way to pull the numeric ID of every account in an X audience from one file.A map of the five Circleboom exports that carry a ProfileId column.The route from that ID file into an X List or an ad audience.
Circleboom exports the followers or following of any public X account, with each account's user ID, through X's Enterprise APIs. Export every ID for your bulk Twitter ID lookup in one CSV.
Why collecting X user IDs one by one breaks down
User IDs are the format that machines trust. An X Ads list audience, an API job, a CRM join and a research dataset all key on the numeric ID, because a username can change and an ID stays with the account.
The trouble starts when you need hundreds of them.
The readers of this guide usually need IDs for one of these jobs:
- An X Ads list audience built from a niche.
- An API job that queries accounts by ID.
- A CRM that has to match the same person across exports.
- A research dataset tracked over months.
Each job needs the same thing from a bulk Twitter ID lookup: a clean column of numbers, one per account, that will still match next quarter.
Published guides tend to assume one of two things: that you can write code against X's API, or that you will pay a scraper per thousand rows. Neither helps a marketer who starts from a niche and a spreadsheet.
The single-handle tools work, but only one handle at a time, which turns a 1,000-account audience into 1,000 separate searches. A bulk Twitter ID lookup needs a different shape of tool.
The mistake I see most often is starting from the wrong end. People collect handles first and then go hunting for IDs.
The faster route runs the other way: pick the audience you want, and pull many X user IDs at once from a list that already contains them.
What Circleboom's export gives you for each X account
Circleboom's Export Followers or Following feature downloads the complete follower or following list of any public X account as a structured CSV, one row per account, and the first column of every row is ProfileId. That column is the user ID.
Your own account works, and so does any other public account.
Why the source of the list matters
Circleboom is listed on X's Enterprise customer directory, and the lists come through X's own APIs rather than through page scraping. That matters for a list of IDs in a way it does not for casual browsing.
On X, another account's follower list stops loading after a point and cannot be sorted or exported, so anything copied from the screen is a partial sample.
What sits next to each ID
Next to each ID, the file records:
- The account's username, display name, location and bio.
- Its tweet, following and follower counts.
- Its creation date.
It also carries flags such as IsProtected, IsVerified, IsFake and IsInactive, which help when you decide which IDs belong in the final list.
The export is token-based. The page shows your remaining balance before you confirm, and each export uses tokens in proportion to the number of accounts in the list, so the cost of a large audience is visible up front.
Reading the ProfileId column without breaking it
Long numbers are where spreadsheets quietly damage an ID file. Newer X accounts carry IDs of 18 or 19 digits, as the follower export itself shows, and spreadsheet apps can show long numbers in scientific notation or round their last digits.
A rounded ID points at a different account or at nothing.
The fix takes one setting: import the ProfileId column as text, not as a number, before you sort, filter or save the file. Open the CSV through your spreadsheet's import option rather than a double-click when the column will be pasted anywhere else.
Handling the ID file after download
An export is a snapshot. Follow relationships change constantly, and profiles change after the export runs, so the file shows the audience as it was at retrieval time.
Date each file, refresh it when a decision depends on today's audience, and store it with care, because account lists can contain sensitive relationship data.
A dated file also earns its keep later. Two exports of the same account taken a quarter apart can be compared row by row on ProfileId, which shows exactly who joined and who left the audience in between, with no guesswork about renamed handles.
Picking the audience and exporting it once is how you finish a bulk Twitter ID lookup in one download instead of a thousand searches.
Where do bulk X user IDs come from?
Bulk X user IDs come from any Circleboom export of accounts, because every account export carries the same ProfileId column. That gives a bulk Twitter ID lookup five possible starting points.
Followers and following are the obvious sources, but they are not the only ones. The right source depends on who the reader of your ad, list or dataset should be.
| Export | What you enter | Whose IDs you get | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Followers | A public username | Everyone who follows it | Ad audiences, prospects |
| Following | A public username | Everyone it follows | Partner research |
| Search results | Keywords or bio terms | Accounts matching the search | Topic-based audiences |
| Retweeters | A tweet link | Everyone who retweeted it | Warm engagers |
| List members | A public X List | Every member of the list | Copying a hand-built list |
The same profile fields sit beside the ID in each of these files, so the rest of your workflow does not change with the source. Retweeter exports add one extra field, the reference to the retweeted tweet.
Retweeters as an ID source
Retweeters are the warmest source in the table. These people already chose to share a message, which makes their IDs a strong base for outreach or an ad audience. The Twitter retweet list extractor walkthrough covers how that audience gets built for targeting.
On X, the list of accounts who retweeted a post is only partly visible and cannot be exported. In Circleboom you paste the tweet link and export retweeters into the same CSV format as a follower list.
Members of a public X list as an ID source
Someone has often done the selection work already. A public X List built by a respected account in your niche is a ready-made set of accounts, and Circleboom can export the members of any public list, not only lists you own. The member file carries the same ProfileId column, so a list someone else built by hand becomes your ID list in one export.
Keyword search as an ID source
A topic audience starts from words, not from an account. Search bios and tweets for terms your buyers use about themselves, export the matching accounts, and the IDs arrive in the same column. This route suits brands whose niche has no single account that everyone follows.
How to get X user IDs in bulk with Circleboom
One export from start to finish: a username goes in, a follower list comes out as a CSV with the IDs in the first column.
The process, step by step, for a bulk Twitter ID lookup on one public account.
Sign in and reach the export tools
- Log in to Circleboom Twitter to open the dashboard where exports run.
- Go to the Essential Toolbox menu and select Export Followers or Following under Export Tools.
Confirm the source account
- Enter the username of the public account whose audience holds the IDs you want.
- Read the preview card to confirm the profile, bio, days on Twitter and follower count match the account you meant.
- Select Export Followers or Export Following, then check the remaining token balance shown under the card.
Download and read the IDs
- Click Export and open the CSV in Excel or Google Sheets; the ProfileId column is your ID list.
The confirmation steps sit in the middle of this bulk ID lookup for a reason. The preview card and the token balance are the last moment to change the account or the list type at no cost, and once Export runs, the file reflects whichever account and option were selected.
Now you have a column of IDs. Next comes the part most guides skip: putting that column to work.
How to add a CSV of X user IDs to a Twitter list in bulk
You add a CSV of X user IDs to a list by reviewing the file in a spreadsheet first and then pasting the IDs into Circleboom's "Add or import new accounts" pop-up. That pop-up accepts X usernames or IDs separated by commas.
The review step is where the value lives:
- Deduplicate.
- Drop rows you do not want.
- Keep only the accounts whose membership will help the list's purpose.
Preparing the IDs for the paste
Deduplicate on ProfileId rather than on username. Two exports from different sources often share accounts, and an ID is the one field that cannot be spelled two ways, so a duplicate check on that column catches every repeat.
A practical way to build the comma-separated string is a spreadsheet join on the ProfileId column, for example TEXTJOIN with a comma as the separator. The method for bulk uploading a CSV of Twitter IDs to a list covers it in more detail.
Adding the IDs in Twitter List Manager
Inside the Twitter List Manager, open the list, click "Add or import new accounts", paste the string, and Circleboom validates the accounts against X data before adding them.
List size limits on X
A few limits apply when the bulk Twitter ID lookup output lands in a list:
- X caps each list at 5,000 members.
- X caps each account at 1,000 lists.
- Circleboom runs bulk adds sequentially through the API, so a large batch takes time and should not be interrupted.
- If a batch hits the 5,000-member ceiling partway, the accounts already added stay on the list and the rest are not added.
A list built from reviewed IDs stays useful longer than one built from whoever was easy to find.
Ads are the other common destination. The same reviewed file can seed Twitter follower look-alikes. X's help page on custom audiences explains how list audiences are used for targeting once the file is uploaded.
Getting X user IDs in bulk, summarized
Getting the user IDs of many X accounts at once is a matter of choosing the right audience and exporting it. Followers, following, search results, retweeters and list members all arrive with a ProfileId column, so a bulk Twitter ID lookup is one export rather than a long session of copying.
I would start with one public account in your niche whose audience matches your buyer, check the preview card, export, and review the file before it goes into a List or an ad audience. The IDs do the rest, because they keep pointing at the same accounts long after the handles in your notes go stale.
→ Get every user ID from an X audience in one file
Bulk ID lookup FAQ for X marketers
Should I use Twitter ID Finder or export the whole list?
Use Twitter ID Finder when you need one account's ID: it is free, needs no login and returns the ID for one username per search. For dozens or thousands of accounts, export the audience instead; the guide on how to find and export Twitter IDs compares both routes.
Will private X accounts block my ID export?
A private account cannot be the source of an export: Circleboom exports only public accounts' follower and following lists, because protected accounts' lists are not accessible through the API even if you follow them. Pick a public account in the same niche as the source instead.
Why does my export have fewer rows than the follower count?
For very large accounts, the API returns follower lists in batches, so the exported row count can sit below the account's displayed follower count. The file reflects every account the API returned within the retrieval window.
