SAN FRANCISCO: After a very successful first few days, Threads’ popularity has declined in the weeks since Meta launched its challenge on Twitter, which lives on despite its problems.
The average time people spend on Threads per day has fallen by more than 75 percent since the platform made its rock star debut on July 6, according to data from Sensor Tower, a market analytics firm.
Threads was quickly labeled a potential death knell for Twitter, a platform that has collapsed into chaos under mercurial mogul Elon Musk.
The launch saw more than 100 million user sign-ups in less than five days, breaking AI tool ChatGPT‘s record for fastest-growing consumer app and creating relief and excitement among early adopters fleeing Twitter.
“I actually closed my Twitter account after I started Threads,” said Brooklyn resident Lauren Brose, head of marketing for the tech startup.
“I used to love Twitter. After Elon Musk took over Twitter, I found the whole environment completely changed.”
But a few weeks later, Threads has since seen a “significant decline in new registrations,” Sensor Tower reported.
Twitter continues to dominate its space as a platform for online comments and news, and Musk would “have to completely destroy it” to drive away its audience forever, according to Silicon Valley investor and analyst Jeremiah Owyang.
“Will Threads kill Twitter? Absolutely not. It’s just not equivalent,” he said.
Threads was listed in the Apple and Android app stores in 100 countries at launch, though it’s not available in Europe because parent company Meta isn’t sure how to navigate European Union privacy laws.
Twitter is thought to have around 200 million regular users, but has suffered repeated technical outages since Tesla mogul Musk bought the platform last year and laid off most of its staff.
Musk, also the head of SpaceX, has alienated users by introducing fees for previously free services and allowing banned right-wing accounts back on the platform.
There is no doubt that Threads has had a significant role compared to other would-be Twitter alternatives.
A few rivals have emerged, but most are niche platforms without the ability to scale to dethrone Twitter.
However, Meta was able to easily invite Instagram users to create Threads accounts, connecting with at least a billion users on the image-focused social network.
Not about news?
According to Insider Intelligence analyst Jasmine Enberg, Threads has a lot to do and add features to become a formidable alternative to Twitter.
It needs to support creators to engage users and find their own identity separate from Instagram and Twitter, Enberg said.
“Given that Twitter is in a state of disarray, a great move they made was to use the existing social graph from Instagram for quick and seamless adoption,” Owyang said of Threads.
The downside is that it’s not a user base you want to chat with or do microblogging with, he added.
Instagram users typically engage images or videos with the service, not comments or controversies, Owyang noted.
“It’s a completely different crowd on Instagram,” Creative Strategies analyst Carolina Milanesi said of the comparison to Threads.
According to a recent post from Threads and Instagram head Adam Mosseri, Twitter is known as a forum for news and politics, topics that Threads is not interested in.
Meanwhile, Twitter is considered the established home for posts by journalists, celebrities, athletes, politicians and more.
Another obstacle to Threads’ growth is that Meta is holding it back from the European Union, Milanesi said.
“You’re missing a big chunk of the market,” she said of Threads’ absence in the EU.
Twitter ‘diaspora’?
As people frustrated with Musk-owned Twitter look for alternatives, no single competitor has established itself as an ideal option.
People who abandoned Twitter became a “diaspora” of sorts, spreading across Mastodon, Bluesky, Threads and other platforms in search of a new social media home, Owyang reasoned.
“A lot of people have left Twitter and that will continue,” Owyang said.
“But the question is, where do they go? There’s no centralized place to go.”
According to Data.ai Intelligence, Threads has been downloaded more than 184 million times worldwide since its launch.
“However, the app has not been shown to be significantly different from Twitter in terms of features/functionality,” said Sensor Tower senior analyst Abe Yousef.
“What should deter people from staying on Twitter, assuming they’re happy with Twitter’s content policies?” Yousef added.
