Shubham Sawarkar
Threads, a text-based app launched by Meta Platforms, has achieved a remarkable milestone, surpassing 100 million users in a matter of days. This rapid growth sets a new record for the fastest-growing app ever, outpacing the previous frontrunner, OpenAI‘s ChatGPT, which took two months to reach the same user count.
The momentous achievement was confirmed early Monday morning through a tracker that monitors publicly available data on Threads accounts. Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, has been providing updates on the app’s growth, expressing his astonishment at the rate of adoption. Within the first two hours of its release, Threads garnered two million users, followed by an impressive milestone of ten million within seven hours.
This surge in popularity has caught the attention of Twitter, a social media giant grappling with its own challenges. In May 2022, Twitter reported 229 million monthly active users, a number that increased to 436 million according to more recent data from Statista. Elon Musk‘s acquisition of Twitter late last year was accompanied by a series of controversial decisions that triggered unrest among users and advertisers. Musk’s latest move was limiting the number of tweets users could access daily.
In response to Meta’s success with Threads, Twitter has allegedly threatened legal action against Meta. A publication called Semafor reported that Twitter’s lawyer delivered a letter to Mark Zuckerberg, outlining their intention to sue Meta.
Meta swiftly countered Twitter’s claims, clarifying that none of the Threads engineering team members have prior experience working for Twitter. The company emphasized the strength of its user base and advertising capabilities through Instagram, positioning itself as a well-funded and potent contender against Twitter.
Experts and analysts agree that Twitter’s recent missteps have created an opportune moment for Meta to emerge as a formidable rival. Niklas Myhr, a marketing professor at Chapman University, highlighted the advantageous timing of Threads’ release, coinciding with Twitter’s limitations on tweet visibility. Leveraging Instagram’s massive user base, Threads is poised for success, with advertisers closely monitoring user adoption.
Related / How to delete Threads profile without losing your Instagram account
While several competitors have emerged in the wake of Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, few have achieved significant traction. Mastodon, a Twitter-like app, boasts 1.7 million monthly active users, while Bluesky, supported by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, has attracted approximately 265,000 users.
