Twitter competitor Threads amasses 30 million users in the first 18 hours since launch
Meta's new Threads app has gained over 30 million downloads in just 18 hours. The app allows users to share text and engage in conversations, but lacks some functionalities of Twitter. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg hopes it will become a popular public conversations app.
Meta's new Threads app has garnered more than 30 million downloads in the 18 hours since its launch on Thursday. Dubbed as the Twitter-killer, Threads app allows users to share text, and links, and engage in conversations by replying to or reposting messages from fellow users.
Reuters, reported that Threads was the top free app on Apple's App Store in the UK and US on Thursday. Meanwhile, Threads could have become the most rapidly downloaded app ever and could surpass over 100 million users in the next two months, New York Times reported.
Threads currently allows users to share posts with upto 500 characters and videos of upto 5 minutes. The Meta-backed app also lacks many important functionalities present in Twitter like hashtags, keywords, direct messages and a desktop version.
Explaining the thought process behind the Threads app, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg noted in a post, “There should be a public conversations app with 1 billion people on it. Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn't nailed it. Hopefully we will,”
Many alternatives to Twitter have emerged following Elon Musk's $44 billion acquisition of the social media giant in October last year. Since the acquisition, Musk has managed to alienate Twitter users and advertisers with some of his chaotic decisions.
In what has been dubbed Twitter 2.0, the company has changed its verification policy, removing the verified blue tick mark for old verified users, while asking users to pay $8 a month for it. In perhaps its most chaotic decision to date, Musk announced imposing a limit on the number of posts users can see in an effort to combat "extreme levels of data scraping".
Even though many alternatives to Twitter have emerged, the Elon Musk-led social media platform has remained popular with users. While Twitter had 229 million monthly active users in May 2022, other competitors to the app such as Bluesky or Mastodon have only managed to attract around 1.7 million and 2,65,000 monthly active users respectively.
(With inputs from agencies)
Catch all the Technology News and Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates & Live Business News.
Business NewsTechnologyNewsTwitter competitor Threads amasses 30 million users in the first 18 hours since launch
First Published:7 Jul 2023, 06:44 AM IST
- Top Gainers
- Top Losers
- 52 Week High