Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg claims 10s of millions of Threads users coming back daily amid reports about drop in engagement

Meta's Threads was off to a blazing start. The Twitter-like app achieved remarkable success, surpassing the milestone of 100 million sign-ups within a mere five days of its launch. However, new reports suggested that the app has already started witnessing a decline in daily active users. However, CEO Mark Zuckerberg expressed his optimism about the app's growing community, noting that tens of millions of people are returning to Threads daily, surpassing the company's expectations.

In a recent Threads post, Zuckerberg said, "I'm very optimistic about how the Threads community is coming together. Early growth was off the charts, but more importantly 10s of millions of people now come back daily. That's way ahead of what we expected. The focus for the rest of the year is improving the basics and retention. It'll take time to stabilize, but once we nail that then we'll focus on growing the community. We've run this playbook many times (FB, IG, Stories, Reels, etc) and I'm confident Threads is on a good path too."

Recent Decline in User Engagement on Threads

Recent data suggests a decline in user engagement on the Threads platform. According to Sensor Tower data, the number of daily active users has dropped by approximately 20 per cent since its debut on July 5. Additionally, Similarweb's analysis reveals a decline of over 25 per cent in daily active users on Android phones globally, with a corresponding decrease of more than 50 per cent in usage time.

In response to these early challenges, Meta is focusing on stabilizing the app's performance, improving the basics, and enhancing user retention. Zuckerberg reassured users that this playbook has been successful for other Meta platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Stories, and Reels. Once these foundational aspects are optimized, the company will shift its attention towards further growing the Threads community.

Despite the current decrease in user engagement, Meta remains hopeful about the future of Threads. The app's initial success has surpassed the company's expectations. It is worth noting that India leads in terms of app downloads, accounting for 33 per cent of global downloads, followed by Brazil (22 per cent) and the US (16 per cent).

The launch of Threads has intensified competition in the social media landscape, with Meta aiming to challenge platforms like Twitter. Meanwhile, Twitter has also been striving to maintain its user base and increase engagement. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and a prominent Twitter user, recently claimed that Twitter's usage was up by 3.5 per cent globally, highlighting its continued relevance.

Meta aims to avoid controversies and political commentaries on their platform. However, one of the major drawbacks that led to the exodus of Twitter employees is also plaguing Meta. Instagram head Adam Mosseri has announced that the company will put rate limits in place to avoid bots and spam on the platform. 

Also read: Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg sent a Threads follow request to Twitter founder Jack Dorsey. Then this happened

Also read: ChatGPT took 60 days, Uber took 70 months: Threads app hits 100 mn users in record 5 days