Bluesky monitoring
Bluesky search and monitoring: track mentions as they are posted
Bluesky's own search is fine for a quick look. It does not save what it finds, score how people feel, or tell you when a conversation grows. Babel42 does those three things.
Bluesky publishes an open stream of every public post, called the firehose. Babel42 reads that stream directly, so a new post that matches your search is picked up within seconds. Bluesky is the one network where Babel42 really is live.
Included on the free plan · no card required · 500 mentions a month free
How Bluesky monitoring works
| Plans | Every plan, including Free. |
|---|---|
| How it is collected | From Bluesky's public firehose, the open stream of public posts. Your search is checked against each new post as it arrives. |
| How fresh | Live. A matching post is collected within seconds of being posted. If you change a search, the new version is picked up within about 30 seconds. |
| History | The firehose only carries new posts, so Babel42 runs one search of Bluesky first to fill in the past. When you create a monitor, Babel42 fetches past posts too: 90 days on Free, rising to two years on the top plans. |
| Sentiment | AI scores every mention we collect as positive, neutral or negative, with a confidence figure. Included on every plan. |
| Accounts | Follow a Bluesky account as a channel to track its posts, follower growth and engagement over time. |
Why a saved search beats Bluesky's search box
A search box answers one question, once. You type a word, read the results and close the tab. Tomorrow you start again, and you have no idea whether the conversation grew or shrank.
A monitor keeps running. Every matching post is stored, so you can see the volume by day, the mix of positive and negative posts, and the accounts that drive the most engagement. That turns Bluesky search into Bluesky analytics for any keyword you care about.
Volume over time
See how many posts mention you each day, and spot the day a thread took off.
Sentiment
Each post is scored positive, neutral or negative, so you can read the mood without reading every post.
The people behind it
Authors are ranked by reach and engagement, so you find the accounts worth replying to first.
Share of voice
Put your brand next to a rival and see who gets talked about more on Bluesky, week by week.
Setting up a Bluesky monitor
Describe what you want to follow in plain words and the Babel42 assistant writes the search for you. You can also write it yourself with AND, OR and NOT. On Bluesky, a hashtag works as an ordinary keyword, so add the tags people use for your brand to the same search.
A search for a brand with a common name needs exclusions. This example catches the brand and its product names, and drops posts about the mythical tower:
("Babel42" OR "Babel 42" OR #babel42)
NOT ("tower of babel" OR "babel fish")What Bluesky monitoring cannot see
Only public posts. Direct messages are private and never appear in the firehose.
The firehose only carries posts from the moment Babel42 starts listening for a keyword. When you add a new keyword, Babel42 searches Bluesky once to fill in its history, and the firehose takes over from there.
Bluesky is still smaller than X or Instagram. For most brands it is one source among several, which is why the same monitor can also watch YouTube, news and the developer forums on the free plan.
A monitor's dashboard, from a demo project. Bluesky posts sit alongside the other networks it watches.
Start with Bluesky, add the rest when you need it
Bluesky is one source in Babel42's social listening tool. One monitor can watch it alongside the other networks you pick, and the results land in the same dashboard, with the same sentiment scoring and alerts. New to the idea? Start with what social listening is.
Bluesky monitoring, answered
Is Bluesky monitoring free?
Yes. Bluesky is on the free plan, with 500 mentions a month, two monitors and 90 days of history. Paid plans start at $29 a month and raise those limits.
How fast do new Bluesky posts show up?
Within seconds. Babel42 reads Bluesky's firehose, the open stream of public posts, and matches each new post against your search as it arrives. It is the only network Babel42 collects live; the others are checked on a schedule.
How far back can I see Bluesky posts?
When you create a monitor, Babel42 searches Bluesky for past posts: 90 days on the free plan, up to two years on the top plans. From then on, new posts come in from the firehose.
Can I track a specific Bluesky account?
Yes. Add it as a channel and Babel42 records its posts, follower growth and engagement over time. The free plan includes one channel.
Does it work with Bluesky hashtags?
Yes. Add the hashtag to your search as a keyword, for example #yourbrand, and posts that use it are matched like any other word.
Other networks we cover
- X (Twitter) monitoring through the official API, as a paid add-on.
- YouTube monitoring for the videos that name your brand, on the free plan.
- Instagram hashtag monitoring a sampled view of the tags around your brand, on paid plans.
- News monitoring for online articles that mention you, on the free plan.
- Review monitoring for Trustpilot and Google reviews, with sentiment, on paid plans.