Threads by Instagram Faces User Engagement Crisis as Rival App X Thrives

Threads, an online social media and networking service operated by Meta Platforms, finds itself grappling with a significant challenge in maintaining its initial user engagement levels. In stark contrast, its rival app X, backed by Twitter and Elon Musk, has experienced a notably more successful trajectory.

Recent data from SimilarWeb Ltd., a specialized data aggregation company focused on web traffic and performance, reveals a concerning decline in Threads’ user engagement. The report indicates that Threads by Instagram suffered a substantial 79% drop in traffic within the span of a month.

In a noteworthy comparison, Threads experienced a substantial influx of 49.3 million daily active users on July 7. However, this number has plummeted drastically, dwindling to a mere 10.3 million active users. Notably, the average time spent on the Threads app has sharply decreased from 21 minutes per day to a mere 3 minutes per day among users in the United States.

Meanwhile, the rival app X, championed by Elon Musk and associated with Twitter, is charting a more successful path. X boasts over 100 million active users, each spending an average of approximately 25 minutes per day on the platform — a stark contrast to Threads’ dwindling figures.