diff --git a/scripts/lib/bird_x.py b/scripts/lib/bird_x.py
index be01d46..66dc13c 100644
--- a/scripts/lib/bird_x.py
+++ b/scripts/lib/bird_x.py
@@ -89,9 +89,11 @@ def _extract_core_subject(topic: str) -> str:
         # Research/meta descriptors
         'best', 'top', 'good', 'great', 'awesome', 'killer',
         'latest', 'new', 'news', 'update', 'updates',
+        'trendiest', 'trending', 'hottest', 'hot', 'popular', 'viral',
         'practices', 'features', 'guide', 'tutorial',
         'recommendations', 'advice', 'review', 'reviews',
         'usecases', 'examples', 'comparison', 'versus', 'vs',
+        'plugin', 'plugins', 'skill', 'skills', 'tool', 'tools',
         # Prompting meta words
         'prompt', 'prompts', 'prompting', 'techniques', 'tips',
         'tricks', 'methods', 'strategies', 'approaches',
@@ -286,6 +288,21 @@ def search_x(
         _log(f"0 results for '{core_topic}', retrying with '{shorter}'")
         query = f"{shorter} since:{from_date}"
         response = _run_bird_search(query, count, timeout)
+        items = parse_bird_response(response)
+
+    # Last-chance retry: use strongest remaining token (often the product name)
+    if not items and core_words:
+        low_signal = {
+            'trendiest', 'trending', 'hottest', 'hot', 'popular', 'viral',
+            'best', 'top', 'latest', 'new', 'plugin', 'plugins',
+            'skill', 'skills', 'tool', 'tools',
+        }
+        candidates = [w for w in core_words if w not in low_signal]
+        if candidates:
+            strongest = max(candidates, key=len)
+            _log(f"0 results for '{core_topic}', retrying with strongest token '{strongest}'")
+            query = f"{strongest} since:{from_date}"
+            response = _run_bird_search(query, count, timeout)
 
     return response
 
diff --git a/tests/test_bird_x.py b/tests/test_bird_x.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3d78bd8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test_bird_x.py
@@ -0,0 +1,57 @@
+"""Tests for bird_x module."""
+
+import sys
+import unittest
+from pathlib import Path
+from unittest import mock
+
+sys.path.insert(0, str(Path(__file__).parent.parent / "scripts"))
+
+from lib import bird_x
+
+
+class TestExtractCoreSubject(unittest.TestCase):
+    def test_strips_trending_noise(self):
+        result = bird_x._extract_core_subject("trendiest Claude Code skills")
+        self.assertNotIn("trendiest", result)
+        self.assertIn("claude", result.lower())
+
+    def test_strips_tool_noise(self):
+        result = bird_x._extract_core_subject("best AI tools for coding")
+        self.assertNotIn("tools", result)
+        self.assertNotIn("best", result)
+
+    def test_strips_skill_noise(self):
+        result = bird_x._extract_core_subject("top claude code skills")
+        self.assertNotIn("skills", result)
+        self.assertNotIn("top", result)
+
+
+class TestBirdSearchRetries(unittest.TestCase):
+    def test_last_chance_retry_uses_strongest_token(self):
+        """When shorter retry also returns 0, uses longest non-noise token."""
+        empty = {"items": []}
+        with mock.patch.object(bird_x, "_extract_core_subject", return_value="best codex skill plugin"), \
+             mock.patch.object(bird_x, "parse_bird_response", return_value=[]), \
+             mock.patch.object(bird_x, "_run_bird_search", return_value=empty) as run_mock:
+            bird_x.search_x("best codex skill plugin", "2026-01-01", "2026-01-31", depth="quick")
+
+        # Should try: original, shorter (2-word), last-chance (strongest token)
+        self.assertEqual(run_mock.call_count, 3)
+        queries = [call.args[0] for call in run_mock.call_args_list]
+        # Last call should use "codex" (longest non-noise word)
+        self.assertIn("codex", queries[2])
+
+    def test_no_retry_when_first_query_has_results(self):
+        """No retry when first query succeeds."""
+        result = {"items": [{"id": "1"}]}
+        with mock.patch.object(bird_x, "_extract_core_subject", return_value="nano banana"), \
+             mock.patch.object(bird_x, "parse_bird_response", return_value=[{"id": "1"}]), \
+             mock.patch.object(bird_x, "_run_bird_search", return_value=result) as run_mock:
+            bird_x.search_x("nano banana prompting", "2026-01-01", "2026-01-31")
+
+        self.assertEqual(run_mock.call_count, 1)
+
+
+if __name__ == "__main__":
+    unittest.main()