Similarweb: Threads had 141.5M DAUs on iOS and Android as of January 7, driven by Instagram promotions, while X had 125M DAUs; X continues to lead on the web
A report from market intelligence firm Similarweb suggests that Meta's Threads is now seeing more daily usage than Elon Musk's X on mobile devices.
Context & Ripple Effects
Threads’ mobile lead follows an earlier U.S. crossover reported by Apptopia, while Meta had already said the service was nearing 275 million monthly users and adding more than a million sign-ups a day in late 2024. The new Similarweb comparison shifts the focus from growth milestones to daily usage on mobile.
The result also highlights a split rather than an outright displacement: Threads leads in app-based daily activity, but X retains the web audience. Instagram promotion is central to that distinction, showing how Meta’s existing distribution can accelerate a newer social product.
First-order effects
- Threads moves ahead of X in measured iOS and Android daily active users, strengthening Meta’s position in mobile text-based social use.
- X retains a web lead, leaving the two services with different usage footholds rather than a single winner across platforms.
Second-order effects
- Instagram’s role in driving Threads usage gives Meta a distribution advantage that rivals without a comparable feeder platform must contend with.
- The platform comparison will increasingly need to separate mobile daily activity from web usage; a single audience metric can obscure where each service is strongest.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern persists, social-network competition may hinge less on standalone app adoption and more on cross-platform distribution from established social ecosystems.
- The split between mobile and web leadership suggests that audience migration can be partial: users may shift daily habits on one surface while preserving another service for different access patterns.
The trend: Threads’ mobile advance is part of a broader trend in which incumbent platform ecosystems use built-in distribution to challenge standalone social services.