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Although an app ’s downloads are n’t an exact proxy for usage , they can suggest at where the market is head up . And in the case of thealt - Twitter war , the app winning the game in good order now is Instagram’sThreads . Meta ’s take on Twitter now sees triple the everyday downloads of X ( formerly Twitter ) on iOS globally , and more than double the number — and sometimes more than triple — the telephone number of installs on Google Play .
This was n’t always the case . Threads , of form , saw a massive ear in novel installs following itssummer 2023 public launch , but in the months since , downloads would often spike and leave out as parent company Meta triedvariousstrategies to institutionalize more dealings to its unexampled app , like showcasing democratic Threads within the timeline of its other apps , Facebookand Instagram . But as boosts from these early elbow grease wore off , togs ’ downloads would drop , bring back once again to become neck - and - neck with decade installs , peculiarly on iOS , according to data fromAppfigures .
However , thing set about to change near the goal of last year .
By late December , Threads was seeing more than half a million installs per twenty-four hours on Google Play and iOS . The latter has since fall a bit during the calendar month of January but , across both platforms , Threads now consistently sees more daily downloads than X and appear to be extend that gap .
For illustration , on February 25 , 2024 , Threads saw 486,803 installs on Google Play and 342,228 on iOS . X , by compare , saw 225,408 Google gambling downloads and 112,625 on iOS , Appfigures data shows . That ’s most triple the downloads on iOS for thread and more than double the downloads on Google Play .
Only a few days prior , on February 22 , the gap was even wider . Then , Threads had 382,999 daily installs on Io versus just 113,649 installs of X on the same program — or more than triple . Threads ’ Google sport downloads were 660,882 at this time , versus just 210,475 for hug drug on the manoeuvre Store — also more than triple .
Though ribbon ’ daily install rates still rise and fall , they ’re now consistently above go ’s . Over time , this alteration could eventually fall to play out across monthly alive users , as well . If that were the font , then Threads would become the main microblogging platform of choice for most users , despite Twitter ’s longtime lead story in this space . What ’s more , it would mean Meta has more editorial mastery over the information - sharing and intelligence ecosystem used by diarist , researcher , academics , intelligence junky , and others — and Meta has said itwon’t amplify news on Threadsand won’trecommend political content .
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Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announcedThreads had 130 million monthly dynamic users ( MAUs)as of the company ’s fourth quartern . Those number have surely edge higher in the week since . Instagram headAdam Mosseri saysthe Threads app is doing “ remarkably well ” in Japan , for example — a securities industry where Twitter had strong adhesive friction .
While X said it had500 million monthly active usersas of last fall , it ’s ill-defined how many of those are automated report or spam . As TechCrunch reported last calendar month , X appears to have a Verified bot problem , where a number of blue - check , paid accounts accidentally revealed their source by replying to go posts with some pas seul of “ I ’m drab , I can not provide the requested feedback as it live on against OpenAI ’s content policy ” — a boilerplate response for the AI.A search for the same enquiry , here on X , let out the job is ongoing .
Though Threads isnot immune to this outlet , more people seem to posting this idiom organically on Meta ’s platform as a jape to their followers .
In part , X ’s hassle with new installs could be have-to doe with to its rebranding from Twitter . Though month - over - month downloads are up by a bit in December and January , they ’re still much low-toned than before the rebranding , Appfigures point out . Threads ’ tax income is also up slightly in January compare with the month prior , but the firm judge February ’s revenue will be lower .
As for the decentralized X alternative , likeMastodon’sofficial nomadic app and the fresh publicBluesky , they barely record in the face of this competition , appearing as mostly prostrate line on the download chart . To be fair , Mastodon has a wide third - political party app ecosystem , but in sum , its electronic connection is hoveringaround 1 million monthly active usersat this time , per its own first - company information .
Bluesky also saw a belittled pop when it opened itsdoors to the public originally this month , but its momentum has since faded . On its fully grown daytime ( February 7 , the solar day after its launch ) , it saw 79,685 installs on iOS and 55,711 on Google Play — nowhere near Threads ’ or Adam ’s turn . Still , it ’s early Day for this social web , which also just opened up federation — where anyone can scat their own Bluesky server . So it ’s potential it will put on grip over time as a decentralised Twitter / ex alternative .
