Updated June 2026: reflects X removing the original-registration-country ("Created in") line after the November 2025 launch, and the current set of "About this account" fields.
Key takeaway: On X (formerly Twitter), "Account based in" is the country or region a profile connects from, shown in the "About this account" panel you open by tapping a profile's join date. X infers it from IP history, app store country, and device signals, not the bio.
When X rolled out "About this account" in late November 2025, it turned a private signal into a public one: the country a profile actually connects from, sitting one tap away on every public account. The reaction was immediate, and users spent days surfacing accounts that posed as locals while operating from other countries. The panel itself, though, ships with almost no explanation, and X never published a definition of "Account based in" or "Connected via," so most people read the labels and guess.
This guide breaks down every field in the panel, how X works out where an account is based, how reliable that is, and how to read it without jumping to conclusions.
One practical gap is worth naming up front: X shows this data one profile at a time, and there is no button to pull it for a list of accounts. If you need the based-in country for many profiles, Sorsa API, an alternative Twitter/X API provider, returns it directly through the /about endpoint at a flat per-request rate, with no per-resource billing and no developer-account approval to clear first. You can query any public account programmatically instead of clicking through profiles by hand. More on that below.
On this page
- What is X's "About this account" panel?
- What does "Account based in" mean on X?
- How does X figure out where an account is based?
- What does "Connected via" mean?
- How accurate is "Account based in"?
- Whose accounts don't show a location?
- How to see where any X account is based
- How to view or hide your own location
- FAQ
What is X's "About this account" panel?
"About this account" is a transparency panel on X that shows context about a profile: the country or region it is based in, its original join date, how many times it has changed its username and when, its verification status, and how it connects to X. You open it by tapping the "Joined [month year]" line under the bio on any public profile, on the web or in the app.
X built the panel to make inauthentic accounts easier to spot, the same idea behind Facebook's Page transparency and Instagram's own account-information view. The bet is that if a profile claims to be one thing while its connection data says another, you can see the mismatch yourself instead of guessing.
Here is what each field reports:
| Field | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Account based in | The country or region X associates with the profile, inferred from connection signals, not the bio |
| Connected via | How the account reaches X: the web, or the app store of a specific country, such as "United States App Store" or Google Play |
| Joined | The account's original creation date |
| Username changes | How many times the @handle has changed, and the date of the most recent change |
| Verified | Whether, and when, the account was verified |
A separate "Created in" line, showing the country where the account was originally registered, appeared briefly at launch and was pulled within days, so you will not see it on profiles today.
What does "Account based in" mean on X?
On X, "Account based in" is the country or region X believes a profile actually connects from, derived from platform signals such as IP address history and the app store the account uses. It is not the location text in the bio, which anyone can type and edit freely. When X is less certain, or when the owner chooses to, the panel can show a broader region or continent instead of a single country.
The distinction from the bio is the whole point. A bio that reads "New York, USA" is a self-reported claim with nothing behind it. "Account based in" is platform-derived, which makes it far harder to fake casually, and that is why the feature exposed so many accounts whose stated and inferred locations did not match. It is still an estimate rather than proof, a nuance the next two sections cover.
How does X figure out where an account is based?
X determines "Account based in" from a combination of signals rather than a single source: historical and recent IP addresses, the App Store or Google Play country tied to the account, payment details for Premium subscribers, and device and connection metadata. It does not use real-time GPS, it does not read the self-reported bio location, and it does not rely on the current IP address alone.
Combining signals is what makes the result more durable than a single IP lookup. A one-off connection from an airport in another country should not, on its own, relabel an account, so X weighs history and multiple inputs. Per X's own Help Center, the country shown in the panel is inferred from aggregated IP addresses rather than a value you set manually.
The platform also watches for VPNs and proxies. When it detects one, it does not block the account; it adds a warning that the location may not be accurate, which is a signal in itself. Sophisticated actors can still defeat the system with residential proxies, local SIM cards, or local devices, so the inference raises the cost of spoofing without making it impossible.
What does "Connected via" mean?
"Connected via" shows how an account reaches X: through the web, or through the app store of a specific country, shown as entries like "Connected via United States App Store" or Google Play. It reflects where the app was downloaded or the account's store region, which can differ from the "Account based in" country, for example when someone registered through one country's store but now connects from another.
That divergence is common and easy to misread. Early in the rollout, reporters documented an account presenting as a Gaza-based journalist that was labelled "based in" Poland while "connected via" an app store in the United Kingdom, which can simply mean the account was set up through that store. Read "Connected via" next to "Account based in," not as a standalone verdict on nationality.
One practical note for anyone pulling this data outside the app: "Connected via" lives only inside the in-app panel. The fields available programmatically through Sorsa's /about endpoint are the based-in country and the username-change history, not the app-store value, so build any workflow around the location and account-age signals rather than the connection method.
How accurate is "Account based in"?
"Account based in" is usually a reliable signal but not proof. Because it is inferred from connection data, it can be wrong for travelers, expatriates, remote workers, people who occasionally use a VPN, or accounts managed by a third-party social media team in another country. When X detects a likely VPN or proxy, it flags the location with an exclamation icon and a note that it may not be accurate.
So treat the value as one low-confidence indicator that needs corroboration, not forensic-grade evidence. A mismatch, say "based in Nigeria" on an account claiming to be a lifelong Texan, is a reason to look closer, not a conclusion. Legitimate explanations exist: diaspora communities, remote staff, international agencies running an account, or a plain technical error.
If you are evaluating an account seriously, cross-reference the location against other signals: the join date versus the claimed history, how often and when the username has changed, posting cadence and language patterns, and engagement sources. Location is one signal among several, the same way a fake-follower audit or a shadowban check tells you something but not everything.
Whose accounts don't show a location?
Not every profile shows location data. An account owner can switch the public display from an exact country to a broader region or continent in settings, government-affiliated accounts (those carrying a gray check) are exempt and show no location at all, and accounts X has little consistent data on may show nothing. The "Created in" line that briefly listed the country of original registration was also removed soon after launch.
In short, an empty or vague location field is not itself suspicious. It can mean a deliberate privacy choice, an exempt account type, or simply that X is not confident enough to name a country.
How to see where any X account is based
To see where an X account is based, open the profile and tap the "Joined [month year]" line under the bio; the "About this account" panel opens and shows the "Account based in" country or region. This works one profile at a time. To check many accounts, you query the data through an API instead of opening each profile.
Here is the manual route, step by step:
- Open the profile on x.com or in the X app.
- Tap the "Joined [month year]" line under the bio.
- Read the "Account based in" country or region in the panel, alongside the join date, username changes, and connection method.
That is fine for one or two profiles. It does not scale, and there is no native export. For a single check without opening the app or writing code, Sorsa's free Location Checker runs the same lookup in the browser. When you need the based-in country for a roster of accounts, the options look like this:
| Method | How you get the data | Works at scale? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| In-app panel | Tap the join date on each profile | No, one profile at a time | Free, but manual and slow beyond a handful |
| Browser extensions | Read the same field and show it in your feed | Limited | Tied to your logged-in session and your own browsing |
| Official X API | Per-resource billing; no simple documented endpoint for the public "Account based in" field | Hard | Built for posts and timelines, not a "based in" lookup |
Sorsa API (/about) | One request returns the account's based-in country and username history | Yes | Any public account, flat per-request rate, JSON output |
Sorsa's endpoint returns the same based-in country the panel shows, plus the username-change count and the date of the last change, for any public profile in a single call. Pricing is a flat per-request rate on every plan rather than per-resource billing, which is why this kind of work tends to land on an API rather than manual checking. If you need to go a step further and map a whole follower base by country rather than check a single account, that is a bulk audience-geography job, and the broader tradeoffs sit in our breakdown of the main Twitter/X API alternatives.
In practice
We see this most with teams that vet accounts at volume. One example is a brand-safety group at a mid-size marketing agency that screens paid creators before signing them. Reading the "About this account" panel by hand works for one or two profiles, not for a roster of several hundred. Pulling the based-in country for the whole list through the /about endpoint turned a multi-day manual check into a single scripted pass and flagged the handful of "local" creators that were actually connecting from other countries for a closer look. The location was a starting signal, not a verdict, which is the right way to use it.
How to view or hide your own location
To control your own "Account based in" display, open Settings, then Privacy and safety, then "About your account," where you can switch between showing your exact country (the default) and a broader region or continent. You cannot fully hide the location: X infers it from connection signals and flags likely VPN use, so the most you can do is make the public label less precise.
That tradeoff is deliberate. The region or continent option exists mainly for people in places where revealing an exact country could carry real risk, and it lowers precision without claiming to erase the underlying inference.
FAQ
Can I check the "Account based in" country for many X accounts at once?
Not from the X app, which shows the panel one profile at a time. To check many accounts, query the data through an API. Sorsa's /about endpoint returns the based-in country and username-change history for any public profile in a single request, at a flat per-request rate, so you can run a whole list programmatically instead of by hand.
Is "Account based in" the same as the location in someone's bio? No. The bio location is free text the user types and can say anything. "Account based in" is the country or region X infers from connection signals such as IP history and the account's app store. Because it is platform-derived rather than self-reported, it is harder to fake, though it is still an estimate, not proof.
Why does an X account show a region or continent instead of a country? Two reasons. The account owner may have switched the display from exact country to a broader region or continent in privacy settings, which X allows. Or X may not have enough consistent signal to narrow it to one country. In both cases the panel shows the broadest level X is confident about.
What does the "may not be accurate" warning on "Account based in" mean? It means X has detected a likely VPN or proxy on the account, so the inferred country may reflect the VPN's exit location rather than where the person really is. X shows the warning with an exclamation icon. Treat a flagged location as low-confidence and corroborate it before drawing any conclusion.
Does "Connected via United States App Store" prove an account is American? No. "Connected via" shows the app store region or where the X app was downloaded, which can differ from the based-in country and from the user's nationality. Someone can register through one country's app store and connect from another. Read it alongside "Account based in," not as standalone proof of nationality.
How can developers get X's "account based in" data programmatically?
The official X API does not expose a simple endpoint for the public "About this account" location. An alternative Twitter/X API like Sorsa returns the based-in country and username-change history through its /about endpoint, for any public account, with flat per-request pricing and JSON output, which makes it practical to enrich large lists of profiles with location data.
Can you hide your country on X completely? Not entirely. You can switch your public display from exact country to region or continent under Settings, Privacy and safety, About your account, which makes the label less precise. You cannot remove location inference altogether, and X flags likely VPN use, so no setting fully hides where an account connects from.
Getting the data yourself
If you only need to check one profile, the in-app panel is the fastest route. If you need "account based in" for a list of accounts, that is where an API earns its place. Sorsa's Account About Info endpoint returns the based-in country and username-change history for any public profile in one call, on a flat 20 requests-per-second limit across every plan, with no application or approval step. Read the pricing and start from the quickstart.
Reviewed by Keksich, founder of Sorsa, marketer and X API researcher.
How this was put together: this explainer draws on our hands-on work building and operating an alternative Twitter/X API, including the Account About Info endpoint that returns this same based-in data, alongside the platform's own documentation and reporting from the feature's launch. For X's account and location behaviour we used X's Help Center; for what the panel shows and how the rollout unfolded, contemporaneous reporting from TechCrunch and NPR; and for the removal of the original-registration-country line and the gray-check exemption, Privacy Guides. Verified June 2026. X's transparency features are still evolving, so check the in-app panel for the current field set.