When Meta’s Twitter clone, Threads, was launched, the media gushed over it’s meteoric growth of users, pronounced Twitter dead, and kneeled before the alter of Mark Zuckerberg, who took down Elon Musk and his outmoded ideas of free speech for all.
For days, we were treated to stories about the number of app downloads, user sign-ups, and comparisons to the other social media apps. What Threads accomplished in days took many, many months for other apps. Few, if any, acknowledged that Threads was standing on the shoulders of Instagram, and that it was likely headed down a similar path as the now-defunct Google+ social media platform. I noted at the time that I wasn’t impressed by Threads’ initial numbers. “It was inevitable that Threads would get a huge number of sign-ups at launch,” I explained. “The real question will be how many active users the app sustains over the coming weeks and months.”
Well, now we know. According to a new report, app engagement is down significantly, and Threads struggles to maintain users. According to data from market research firms Similarweb and Sensor Tower, Threads’ daily active user count is down a whopping 82%, as of July 31. Daily active users peaked at 44 million the day after its launch and now sit at just eight million. For comparison, Twitter’s monetizable active-user count is nearly 200 million.
For our VIP members: Will Elon Musk’s Latest Move Do More Damage to Twitter Than Threads Ever Could?
All those media reports that rushed to predict the death of Twitter were clearly projecting.
Sensor Tower also found that people are spending less time on the app and opening it less frequently.
On its launch day, Threads users opened the app an average of 14 times and spent an average of 19 minutes scrolling through it, the company reported. By the end of the month, however, those figures had fallen sharply.
As of August 1, Threads’ daily average time spent fell to just 2.9 minutes a day, and people spent only 2.6 sessions per day using the app, said Abe Yousef, a senior insights analyst at Sensor Tower.
Findings from Similarweb showed the same pattern of decline. Threads’ user count peaked at roughly 49 million on July 7, the day after launch, and fell steadily to just over 11 million by July 29, said David Carr, a senior insights manager at Similarweb.
The steepest drop-off occurred in the two weeks immediately following Threads’ launch. But the new data show how the decline has continued and is ongoing.
Threads’ daily active user count is reportedly falling at a rate of 1% each day. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg claims he’s “quite optimistic” nevertheless.
“We saw unprecedented growth out of the gate and more importantly we’re seeing more people coming back daily than I’d expected,” he said. “And now, we’re focused on retention and improving the basics. And then after that, we’ll focus on growing the community to the scale we think is possible.”
Don’t count on it. For all the hype, Threads looks to be following the path of Google+, a platform that had a huge surge of users at launch but ultimately did not give users what they really wanted. Threads may not die completely, but clearly, it’s not going to kill Twitter.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member