A mute feature has started appearing on Twitter, allowing members to effectively silence others they follow without them knowing, Digital Spy said.

The feature is ideal for those you may feel obliged to follow but don't necessarily want to hear from, and serves as an alternative to blocking outright.

Muting hides all of a member's tweets and retweets from your own timeline, and can be switched on and off at will.

Twitter client TweetDeck has been supporting the feature, and it comes in useful if someone is live tweeting something that does not interest the user, or sharing TV spoilers that they would rather avoid.

The microblogging service appears to be quietly rolling out the feature, although no official announcement has been made.

Meanwhile, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo told Bloomberg that he would like to incorporate a 'whisper mode' for when a user wants to make a public discussion private, removing the need to restart the conversation via direct messages.