To see the context of a reply, just click on it. This will show you the reply itself in an enlarged format plus the thread it is part of. After you’ve clicked on a reply, scroll up or down to see the other replies in the thread.
You can see all the branches of the thread by clicking on the first post at the very top of the thread.
Is there any way to see the most complete version of the thread?
Because of the way servers federate together, your server may not always show 100% of the replies in a conversation thread. You can see the most complete version of a thread by using original pages:
- Click on the first post of the thread, at the very top
- Click on ⋯ for the first post of the thread
- Select the option Open original page or Open in browser, which will open the thread on the website of the poster’s server
Why can’t I see the most complete version of the thread automatically?
At the moment Mastodon only shows posts and replies that have federated to your server. However, there is an experimental feature currently being tested on Mastodon which will automatically fetch all the replies in a thread. When this is properly launched, it will mean you don’t have to use original pages.
If you’re a techy person, you can see the details of the thread-fetching system on the Mastodon Github ⧉.