Threads Soars to 275 Million Monthly Users, Says Zuckerberg

An anonymous Slashdot reader shared this report from CNBC: Threads now has nearly 275 million monthly users, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Wednesday. "We continue to be on track towards this becoming our next major social app," Zuckerberg said on a call with analysts, adding that he was "quite pleased" with the trajectory of the app.

The latest numbers indicate Threads is up 175% from a year ago when it reached 100 million users... The app is now signing up more than 1 million users per day, Zuckerberg also said on Wednesday. X remains ahead of Threads in terms of users, but not by much. Musk's social media app now has roughly 318 million monthly users, according to an estimate by market intelligence firm Sensor Tower. That's down 24% since Musk completed his acquisition of the company in October 2022, according to Sensor Tower.
The news also drew a reaction from ActivityPub/Activity Streams 2.0 co-author Evan Prodromou, who pointed out that the 275 million monthly active users is up from the 200 million reported just 13 weeks ago at the end of July.

"And most of them have access to the Fediverse. With more, hopefully, getting access soon."

And yetâ¦

[MonkeyTrial]

I may not be the demographic (61, but working in tech since 1987 so fairly aware of and interested in new things), but I do not know a single person who uses Threads. No one has ever said to me âoeCheck out this cool thing on Threadsâ. Is there a mysterious, exclusive club of 275M people I donâ(TM)t know about?

Re:

[2TecTom]

I'm guessing you just don't know enough bots yet. This is what all that AI is for, to pump up their subscriber numbers in order to increase their ad revenue. It's all a corrupt classist scam, welcome to our corporatocracy.

Re:

[backslashdot]

There are so many bots talking to each other on it, pretty soon the conversations will switch to machine code.

Re:

[sdinfoserv]

I am in your exact same demographic (age, time in tech), and i run the IT department for City on the West Coast. West Cost cities tend to be frothing with desire to connect with the citizenry via social media.. We've not had a single request from any department or any citizen for information regarding "threads". And no, none of my colleagues or friends use it. Interestingly, my kids (20's and 30's) have soured on all things Zuck and no longer use FB to communicate amongst their friends. . Zuck's post

Re:

[Octorian]

And yet I seem to know a bunch of people who obsessively share links to BlueSky, which doesn't seem to get much media attention at all.

Given how Threads is basically something anyone on Facebook/Instagram automatically has an account with, and how there are obsessive notifications pushing people to open it (whether or not they actually care to), I have a hard time believing any such high-level usage statistics. Simply tapping those notifications by accident, then leaving two seconds later, is likely enough

Re:

[DevNull127]

Threads already has something like 85% of the number of people using Twitter. But I think what that really means is: all the liberals left Twitter. So now there's just a lot fewer people on Twitter, and Threads is catching up to that (smaller) number.

But does anyone enjoy it?

[mukundajohnson]

All I have seen on it is baity crap content. It's like X, but somehow worse? Am I the only one thinking that?

Re: But does anyone enjoy it?

[Apotekaren]

More like âItâ(TM)s like X but not as bad⦠yetâ.

The baity marketing is annoying, and every time I do check out the content the nags about registering or downloading the app instantly kills any interest.

I wouldn't call it worse

[rsilvergun]

It's not flooded by pussy pics in bio and snuff films so it's at least got enough moderation to keep that garbage at bay.

As for enjoying it it has the advantage that you can at least still properly block people. Even right-wing shock jock Tim Pool dumped Twitter after they remove the ability to block people. Also I don't think you can buy your way into people's feeds the same way you can on Twitter. And of course Mark zuckerberg's posts don't immediately show up in your feed whether you want them to or

Re:

[sarren1901]

It's scary you got modded troll for what is actually an insightful post.

Re:

[HBI]

Denial is a powerful force.

274 million bots use threads daily

[WaffleMonster]

"Streams 2.0 co-author Evan Prodromou, who pointed out that the 275 million monthly active users is up from the 200 million reported just 13 weeks ago at the end of July."

Translation: Surprise, my social media platforms usage skyrocketed before the elections.

Re:

[timeOday]

Good point, but the ratio between Threads and "X" seems like the important thing. At this point, why wouldn't Threads win?

Or, maybe Twitter was a novelty that has somewhat blown over and nothing similar will become what it used to be.

Not surprising if you use instagram

[blahbooboo2]

If you use instagram, its constantly pushing the service with ads and ways to trick users to sign up. Plus with Musk's actions, folks are looking for the next place to whine online not affiliated with him.

That didn't work for Google

[rsilvergun]

Remember circles? It's very difficult to break in to social media. Twitter's implosion was a huge gift to Mark Zuckerberg basically giving him an entire new market that he could pretty readily dominate. By itself he wouldn't be able to pull users away from Twitter because inertia just keeps people on the platforms they know.

The only exception to that is young people tend to dump Facebook because their parents are on it and Zuckerberg sells that problem by just buying up Facebook competitors but Facebook

dying already

[rabbirta]

i've never in real life talked about this service.
they're bragging about having less than 12% of the userbase of Instagram, realistically they have even less than that

if something as polished and expensive as Concorde can disappear overnight because no one cared about it, so too can 'threads'

could be the platform hit the criticality point...

[Jayhawk0123]

Could have been that they've reached that point of criticality where there are enough users that new users add it to their social media catalogue seeing it as of enough value... After the changes at Twitter, I sure as hell am looking for a replacement for it. Something simple like twitter used to be. To the point.

I sure hope it's not a case of bots migrating to the platform for spamming for the elections.

It (Twitter) was a great source of info when you followed the correct accounts and usually kept me updated on what i needed to know in my field to stay ahead of things that could impact my job. (infosec... twitter was days to weeks ahead of publications/official press releases from vendors about vulnerabilities/issues).

Doubt there will be many security experts migrating from Twitter, via Instagram, to Threads.

*Sorry, I refuse to use Musks dumbass rebranded name of Twitter, X.

Re:

[stabiesoft]

What has surprised me is how sticky the real accounts have been. twitter is now essentially the Star, or a movie/aliens rag at the grocery checkout. No federal/state/city/company org would put ads in a rag like that. And yet they are still using twitter. Once those groups figure out a better way to distribute info, twitter is down the tubes. I fondly remember when these orgs would call the tv station and give a response or even the old PR notices on AP. Good old days.

Re:

[quantaman]

What has surprised me is how sticky the real accounts have been. twitter is now essentially the Star, or a movie/aliens rag at the grocery checkout. No federal/state/city/company org would put ads in a rag like that. And yet they are still using twitter. Once those groups figure out a better way to distribute info, twitter is down the tubes. I fondly remember when these orgs would call the tv station and give a response or even the old PR notices on AP. Good old days.

Musk's takeover has been an interesting experiment in that regard. When a social media app hits critical mass it is shockingly hard to dislodge. And even when it does happen it happens horizontally, from another entrenched app (FB/Instagram) moving into the space instead of a new competitor showing up.

I do wonder what the long term future of Twitter is. At a certain point it's just another Parler, and even Even Musk may tire of sinking in $1/2 billion every year to keep it afloat (though if the user base co

Re:

[stabiesoft]

Yeah I know, frankly I'm befuddled. I've got some neighbors that are Jewish and the wife refuses to get off twitter as some of her groups are on there. This is the same neighbor who will not buy a Ford vehicle because of WWII and F's position on it. And yet twitter is ok. I don't get it. Those Ford family members are long since dead, but I feel musk is still apartheid in his thought processes. I believe it was Faulkner had a line in a book, "Memory believes before knowing remembers". Not sure musk has ever

Big "nope" to both their houses.

[Eunomion]

The internet was supposed to free people, not "free" their septic tanks on to the dining room table. Can't trust either Meta or X.