Twitter has chosen April 1—also known as April Fool’s Day—as the date to begin eliminating historical blue checkmarks from the platform.

Although Twitter chose a significant day, the removal of legacy checkmarks has been anticipated for months. Because “the way in which they were given out was corrupt and ridiculous,” Musk wrote in a tweet from December that the business would eliminate such checks “in a few months.”

Since then, users who have the legacy blue checkmark have noticed a pop-up that says, “This is a legacy verified account,” when they click on their checkmark. That might or might not be noteworthy.

Checkmarks were a way for Twitter to confirm that a person or organisation was active, real, and interesting before Musk bought the company. Free verified checkmarks were distributed.

Today, Twitter users can subscribe to Twitter Blue for $8 per month (iOS and Android signups will cost $11 per month owing to app store expenses), which gives them access to a blue check. To indicate, for instance, if an account belongs to a corporation or a government, additional checkmark colours and emblems are also available for purchase.

According to Twitter, purchasing a checkmark entitles users to subscriber-only benefits including fewer advertisements on their timeline, conversational priority sorting, bookmark folders, and the ability to compose lengthy tweets and edit them as well as undo them.

The news was released shortly after Twitter also revealed that the Blue membership was available everywhere.

TechCrunch asked Twitter for more details regarding the number of people who had already signed up for Twitter Blue, but the company did not answer.