Meta's Threads is catching up to Twitter in its active user base.
A recent study from app intelligence firm data.ai found that Threads now has a fifth of Twitter's active user base more than a week after its release.
Meta launched Threads as a Twitter alternative on July 6 and has seen much success since.
Narrowing The Lead
data.ai found Threads attracted an audience of approximately 93 million active users globally during its first partial week of availability. A fifth of Twitter's weekly active user base (WAU) and 86 times that of Donald Trump's Truth Social, with one million WAU as of last week.
The app intelligence firm stated it combined its initial figures with AI and machine learning to gain the findings it used to make its conclusions. Nevertheless, the firm acknowledged that what Threads achieved is unprecedented so early in a social media app's lifecycle - the world's top social apps have WAU counts starting in the half-billion range years into their lifecycles.
This success could be attributed to Threads' integration with Instagram which allows Instagram users to use their accounts to sign up for Threads easily. In fact, Reddit co-founder Alex Ohanian said in a video that Threads had such a successful launch it solved the "cold start problem" social media platforms have thanks to its Instagram integration.
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Interestingly enough, it's not Americans who are the leading demographic when it comes to the number of downloads Threads has. According to data.ai's findings, the top five countries that downloaded Threads the most are India (33%), Brazil (22%), the USA (16%), Mexico (8%), and Japan (5%).
Despite the achievement, Meta found a 20% dip in its daily active user count on July 11 and 12 compared to its July 15 count, per a CNBC report citing a Sensor Tower study. The intelligence firm also noticed that time spent by users on Threads went down by 50% - from 20 minutes to 10 minutes.
A Long Way From Success
Regardless of this slight decline, Threads' momentum is far from over; Threads has now achieved over 150 million downloads by its current estimates. This is a number even Niantic's Pokemon Go couldn't accomplish in the same period when it launched in July 2016.
Sensor Tower managing director Anthony Bartolacci said that the slight decline Threads experienced proves that it still faces an uphill battle to carve out space in most users' social network routines. "The backing of Meta and the integration with Instagram likely gives Threads a much higher flood than other services, but it will need a more compelling value proposition than simply 'Twitter, but without Elon Musk,'" he added.
David Carr, senior insights manager at Similarweb, agrees with Bartolacci's statement, saying that not every user has made a habit of visiting Threads as often as they might other social media apps despite the success it initially enjoyed.
A Meta spokesperson revealed that the company acknowledges that Threads is still finding its way in the social media market. However, it remains excited about the app's success, and its focus now is ensuring stable performance, delivering new features, and improving user experience in the coming months.
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