Mastodon
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| Mastodon | |
 Social networking, back in your hands | |
| URL | https://joinmastodon.org/ |
| Status | Special case |
| Archiving status | Special case |
| Archiving type | Unknown |
| IRC channel | #archiveteam-bs (on hackint) |
Mastodon is a federated social network which is comparable in functionality to Twitter and part of the Fediverse. Due to the federation, instances are constantly joining the network or disappearing.
As of January 2019[update], it is not possible to properly migrate an account (including posts) from one instance to another[1][2].
Since May 2019, ArchiveTeam has not archived Mastodon or any other Fediverse instances; see the Fediverse page for details.
Archival
Instances can be archived reasonably well by starting a recursive crawl from the "about" page, which contains a link to the admin profile. This may not cover the entire instance though. A more complete coverage requires first crawling the API to retrieve a full list of accounts on the instance, then starting a recursive crawl from those. The API as well as the ActivityPub endpoints also offer other ways to obtain a dump of the status data, e.g. by iterating over the public timeline or over the accounts' outboxes; this does not produce (easily) browsable archives but can be accessed much better programmatically.
A patchset for a CLI Mastodon viewer can output URLs for archiving, including JavaScript based pages, the API requests they make and RSS URLs as well as outlink URLs, but it is not production ready yet and only intended for targeted archiving.
Mastodon has a built-in feature allowing for automatic post deletion, instancewide [3] or at the behest of individual users [4].
In cases when server was turned off or died quietly, without sending DELETE requests out, odds are much of its information is still cached on major instances. On those of them where you have an account, you can simply paste the user or status URL to the search bar and click "Open in Mastodon"; on those where you don't, mastodon-post-getter will try some API hacks to get the information. Text is much more likely to remain in cache than images.
Lists of instances
- instances.social[IA•Wcite•.today] – As of 2019-01-15, this lists 6066 instances, a bit over 4100 of which are marked as down.
- the-federation.info[IA•Wcite•.today] – Not only Mastodon but the entire Fediverse. Opt-in and therefore incomplete. As of 2019-01-28, 4298 nodes (instances) are listed in total, 2748 of them running Mastodon.
- https://github.com/distsn/instances[IA•Wcite•.today] – Automated discovery through each instance's peers. Covers also GNU social, Pleroma, and Misskey.
Dead and dying instances
- 2026-10-28[5]toot.community, as of 2026-08[update], there are 34,224 users and 2,174,673 posts.[6]
- 2026-08-10[7]mastodon.cloud, as of 2026-06[update], there are 278,711 users and 6,338,227 posts.[8]
- 2026-01-31[9] mastodon-japan.net, there were 18,128 users and 6,626,703 posts.[10]
- 2025-12-20[11] bms.social
- 2025-03-16[12] tbs.social, user count unknown
- 2024-12-27[13] aethy.com, user count unknown
- 2024-12-17[14] mozilla.social, 182 active users
- 2024-12-01[15] social.npo.nl, 6 users
- 2024-10-29[16] botsin.space, 2.5k users
- 2024-09-23[17] strangeobject.space, 168 users
- 2024-07-04[18] enshittification.social, 21 users
- 2024-05-18[19] social.network.europa.eu, 18 users
- 2024-01-01[20] cybre.space, 2.86k users
- 2023-06-16[21] home.social, 5.7k users, later became a Social Media Marketing website, and then a redirect to https://meme.am/home-social[IA•Wcite•.today].
- 2023-05-09[22] mastodon.lol, 18k users
- 2022-12-01[23] mastodon.technology, 23.6k users
- 2020-11-1[24]: snouts.online[25], 3054 users, 2265852 statuses, Partially saved/Not saved yet
- between 2019-10-09[26] and 2019-11-16: mastodon.dregin.com[27][28], 16 users, 98 statuses, Saved!, job:6t10b41nvx3gdl7pjsebx56dm
- between 2019-07-14[29] and 2019-08-11[30]: www.bookbeezhive.com[31], 101 users, 6345 statuses, Saved!, job:tthg1hszz9bjl1uwxzoy9a7w
- 2019-05-18: berries.space[32][33], 3k users, 634k statuses, Saved!, job:11lu0srbwxroh7huboiej67wp, job:8grwhmq7awexfnuozbd6o29h9 (The fallout of the archiving of this instances resulted in the moratorium on Fediverse archival)
- between 2019-05-06[34] and 2019-11-16: waytoo.online[35], 3 users, 786 statuses, Saved!, job:au35hf4x8hwq290wf3v7nr4vt
- 2019-05-07: smusi.ch[36], 548 users, 4776 statuses, Saved!, job:a1ylhltresype3wqgti7j75xq
- 2019-05-??: terrafirma.space[37], number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- 2019-04-28: friends.nico[38], 48k users, 23.6M statuses, Partially saved, job:bnep6tuzykw7n2p00d1fzo8os, job:8fmcbfaimu9yxyw6o9ov41ewi, job:boyjduz4g0zwd6jkickjaclfo, job:36y6ladhmmtkfnthy4xljnh46, job:cxhzh6fdf1rvxqt952r3eo5h5, job:2p8yjkcv6gljavrs4n8m1uly8, job:3mqd2z115rjuv6hszk1ulf2s8
- 2019-04-26: muses.gallery[39], 135 users, 2369 statuses, Saved!, job:dvgy39m1dh3kiacf72g6uy70
- 2019-04-16: prose.zone[40], 125 users, 29k statuses, Saved!, job:77eyy43pwo1t6ss9cxmorqgfi
- 2019-04-22: humanities.one[41][42], 71 users, 800 statuses, Saved!, job:ae3aq93csqv597wdzlatfjvj4
- 2019-04-??: djs.social, after first announcing a shutdown end of February[43][44] and then announcing that the instance would stay online with changed rules[45], it shut down sometime between 2019-04-13[46] and 2019-04-22[47]; 174 users, 2.9k statuses, Saved!, job:4v0owecf2yc17orqaavuggpdr
- 2019-04-??: lamp.institute[48] disappeared between 2019-04-08[49] and 2019-04-13[50], 46 users, 84k statuses, Saved!, job:8kqsx32rlhdtclls5g1b37la2
- 2019-04-09: pleasehug.me[51], 192 users, 15k statuses, Saved!, job:2nn2fx0ge4zf7az19gyfj5g10
- 2019-01-??: mastodon.rocks seems to have broken entirely sometime between 2019-01-23[52][53] and 2019-02-03[54] with the "about" page returning an error 500 page, and the SSL certificate expired on 2019-03-05[55] and was not renewed as of 2019-03-24[56]; 441 users, 2781 statuses as of 2019-01-15[57], Lost
- 2019-01-19: ilovela.in[58], 34 users, 18k statuses, Saved!, job:cme7xo8rj4oacpkbkll0tffga
- 2019-01-10: threddy.social[59][60], number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- 2019-01-06: theboss.tech[61], 243 users and 724k status as of November 2018[62], Lost
- 2018-12-??: apoil.org, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- 2018-12-??: webdev.network[63], 144 users, 765 statuses, Saved!, job:3w7bgh9a2or69ke15dfyttzib
- 2018-11-01: unixcorn.xyz[64], 1k users and 33k statuses as of May 2018, Lost
- ca. 2018-10-??: bofa.lol, created 2018-08-17 according to WHOIS[65], 630 users and 143k statuses as of 2018-09-05[66], Lost
- after 2018-05-10: spooky.pizza, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- 2018-04-30: witches.town[67], 2.4k users, 1.3M statuses, Saved!, job:do3wklp5q85gm4pfkhqn76gj
- 2018-03-16: mastodon.rocks crashed and lost all data, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- 2018-03-07: hiveway.net[68], 1.4k users, 5.5k statuses, Saved!, job:2i0bmlsqg80ugsyg7tyxp11x9
- after 2018-02-04[69]: social.arbleizez.bzh, Lost
- 2017-10-??: socially.constructed.space, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- ca. 2017-09-??: fern.surgeplay.com, 163 users and 882 statuses as of June 2017[70], Lost
- ca. 2017-07-??: toot.works, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- ca. 2017-06-??: pouet.sbaron.fr, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- after 2017-04-??: wogan.im, number of users and statuses unknown, Lost
- ca. 2017-04-??: masto.yellowkeycard.net, number of users and statuses unknown (probably single-user[71]), Lost
- ca. 2017-04-??: mastodon.cx, 1.7k users, 3.9k statuses, Lost
Other archives or attempts
- 2019-05-08: social.librem.one, number of users and statuses unknown, Saved!, job:4aruc15c0yjd7hs4112bms8l9
- 2019-05-01: social.librem.one, number of users and statuses unknown, Partially saved, job:niq8tzh55qp5ecml2f52kycp
- 2019-04-24: redwombat.social, certificate expired on 2019-04-20 and hasn't been renewed as of 2019-05-03, 3 users, 4k statuses, Saved!, job:84jbeob4ggd61pfzrmu6jaayq
- 2019-04-07: social.privacytools.io, 371 users, 714 statuses, Saved!, job:a2kfq84qzk4x03jq36cdchjfy
- 2019-01-16: mastodon.mit.edu, 523 users, 73k statuses, Saved!, job:eld9e7mlgqqzn6eez8o6d2cds
- 2019-01-15: comm.network, 17 users, 2.3k statuses, Saved!, job:477cfpmlf91qgzahcu3doz8i7
- 2018-09-05: girlcock.club, 208 users, 17.2k statuses, Saved!, job:e0eyw802j202q2xdtb5y7vluf
- 2018-09-04: catdon.life, 779 users, 44k statuses, Saved!, job:ij3sp1n9f9o8dz8aum7z2nlb
- 2018-09-04: mst3k.interlinked.me, 191 users, 207k statuses, Saved!, job:1wrz1h6fddtug7aboj3lm6u7e
- 2018-07-04: comm.network, Not saved yet, job:4syxicv0vopadoq2qoo5uu296 failed
- 2018-04-16: tenforward.social, 338 users, 12.8k statuses, Saved!, job:4n4gyhnp9i31dxtpyi8hbedhk
Outdated instances
Instances that are running old versions of Mastodon are likely to not be properly maintained anymore and may be at risk of disappearing. They are tracked at:
Instance homepage grabs
User:JustAnotherArchivist is regularly running !ao jobs for all known instances' homepages (= "about" pages for current versions of Mastodon) through ArchiveBot based on the instances.social list:
- 2019-01-15: job:47hdn6nhv6ed9fvd7mzjuweqr
- 2019-02-03: job:132ttwrv8yg8mxk5hr0d8w73u
- 2019-03-08: job:btkyf4lv1ldln7ztfqaypb1r1
- 2019-03-24: job:4cs2unovzjjkyv0kdcuwnqsns
- 2019-04-13: job:377h9t2x30x8q9r8qbcbitiu4
- 2019-04-22: job:35o5vbnapwattts5snjt4uls9
- 2019-04-28: job:7ubr9t6k4l7xh19xyilygqk71
- 2019-05-05: job:efkjot1d6mpvphjasn1n8pkk3
- 2019-05-12: job:dy5f6i9tmdep5w3o2nzrbf6b
- 2019-05-19: job:22a28tmnp0s0sq8j4j7sro6wl
- 2019-05-27: job:e64uxjvpxab32cydg8ze56it2
- 2019-06-04: job:b1how24ydggvmxv90lrkenghb
- 2019-06-10: job:cqqrq2xdy10g7tejz33erb62v
- 2019-06-17: job:9pgmqb2iq7b5ifq64xpqzfxwq
- 2019-07-01: job:9vfkmobgbmnv3ee63wamy1mf9
- 2019-07-14: job:851s47v7cd1f0ejj06rfuzpq8
- 2019-08-11: job:9mvltsu5h23cg6k7l918hbzdh
References
- ↑ https://github.com/tootsuite/mastodon/issues/177[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/12423[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/875[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://infosec.exchange/@Em0nM4stodon/109367449562229972[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://social.jorijn.com/@jorijn/statuses/01KYN00AP3NCZXCFB96KQB8GN2[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.fediverse.observer/toot.community[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.cloud/@TheAdmin/116880479865941905[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.fediverse.observer/mastodon.cloud[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon-japan.net/@kuroringo/115353035008655852[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ Example[IA•Wcite•.today]URL not specified; if the URL contains an = please prefix it with 1= so it is not treated as a named template parameter
- ↑ https://fohte.net/blog/posts/2025-11-30-close-bms-social[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://tbs.social/@thisisrjg/113844024503274325[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://aethy.com/@News/113556676109175443[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/mozilla-social-faq[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://npo.nl/innovatie/projecten/decentrale-sociale-media[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://muffinlabs.com/posts/2024/10/29/10-29-rip-botsin-space/[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://blog.strangeobject.space/posts/2024-09-23-shutting-down.html[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://enshittification.social/@Enshittification/112594134173798653[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://www.edps.europa.eu/press-publications/press-news/press-releases/2024/edps-decentralised-social-media-pilot-end-successful-story_en[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://cybre.space/~chr/cybre-space-eol[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://www.reddit.com/r/Mastodon/comments/13qe3yh/everyone_homesocial_will_close_down_on_june_16th/[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.lol/@nathan/109836633022272265[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://ashfurrow.com/blog/mastodon-technology-shutdown/[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://snouts.online/@Sapphicgiraffic/105133310163251117[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://snouts.online/@Sapphicgiraffic/105133310163251117[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20191009151917/https://mastodon.dregin.com/about
- ↑ https://mastodon.dregin.com/@dregin/101841772024992131[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.ie/@dregin/102033888477173336[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190714012148/https://www.bookbeezhive.com/about
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190811222932/http://www.bookbeezhive.com/
- ↑ https://www.bookbeezhive.com/@PletchaPJWebb/101982288878668788[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://berries.space/@mods/102039498886510781[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://is.nota.live/@ida/102103468237073449[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190506180209/https://waytoo.online/about
- ↑ https://waytoo.online/@hypirlink/102021347784209856[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://smusi.ch/@smusi/101844877814629349[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.social/@mastohost/102028765248401685[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://friends.nico/@friends_nico/101827010188335801[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://muses.gallery/@giantrobotbee/101954430173985710[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://prose.zone/@kindness/101936000262244658[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://humanities.one/@lrhodes/101818106595113336[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://humanities.one/@lrhodes/101870169333337017[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://djs.social/@damien/101381657119712906[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://djs.social/@tipsandtricks/101387593257993357[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://djs.social/@damien/101549632451437412[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190413170337/https://djs.social/about
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190422202227/http://djs.social/
- ↑ https://lamp.institute/@amy/101860606687776398[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190408175646/https://lamp.institute/about
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190413174519/http://lamp.institute/
- ↑ https://pleasehug.me/@Kirschn/101891650141822033[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://mastodon.rocks/@Glenn[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://mastodon.rocks/@UBports/with_replies?max_id=101419312194725348[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ job:132ttwrv8yg8mxk5hr0d8w73u
- ↑ https://crt.sh/?id=1003316809[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://crt.sh/?q=mastodon.rocks[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190115160206/https://mastodon.rocks/about
- ↑ https://ilovela.in/@tA/101404667036176695[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://twitter.com/ThreddyTheTrex/status/1083482118095687681[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://mastodon.xyz/@MrJimmy/101391264142311165[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20190107100851/https://theboss.tech/[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20181112130414/https://theboss.tech/about[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://webdev.network/@akmur/101259121075585625[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://unixcorn.xyz/@unixcorn/100661126190416872[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://www.whois.com/whois/bofa.lol[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20180905070653/https://bofa.lol/about
- ↑ https://witches.town/@TheSupreme/99790692010452099[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://hiveway.net/@hiveway/99637137678915164[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://framapiaf.org/@franckridel/99466298851989160[IA•Wcite•.today]
- ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20170615132342/https://fern.surgeplay.com/about/more
- ↑ https://mastodon.social/@bkeej[IA•Wcite•.today]