Threads Overtakes X in Global Daily Mobile Users for the First Time

Threads overtakes X in global daily mobile users with 143M active accounts. Meta’s platform surges 37.8% YoY while X’s mobile audience continues to contract.

#Threads

Meta’s Threads is beginning to pull away from Elon Musk’s X in the battle for mobile engagement , according to new estimates from analytics firm Similarweb reported by Forbes. During the opening weeks of January , Threads averaged approximately 143 million daily active users globally on mobile devices, decisively surpassing X’s average of 126 million.

The trajectory of the two platforms stands in stark contrast. Similarweb’s year-over-year analysis reveals that Threads has surged by 37.8 percent , whereas X’s global daily mobile audience contracted by 11.9 percent over the same period. The situation is more nuanced within the United States , where X maintains a fragile lead. Early January data places X at roughly 21.2 million daily active US mobile users, slightly ahead of Threads’ 19.5 million.

However, the momentum in the US clearly favors Meta. Threads has seen its domestic mobile usage climb by nearly 42 percent over the last year, outpacing X’s 18 percent growth. It is important to note that X remains the dominant force on desktop , attracting around 150 million daily users or visits worldwide, while Threads’ web presence lags significantly at just 9 million.

The Forbes report also highlighted Similarweb data regarding Bluesky , the competitor originally backed by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey. Dorsey left the board in the summer of 2024 and later told Pirate Wires that he believed the platform was “literally repeating all the mistakes we made as a company.” Since opening registrations in 2024, the network has struggled to retain an audience; it currently holds a daily mobile user base of 3.6 million, representing a steep year-over-year decline of 44.4 percent.

Beyond user metrics, X faces renewed controversy regarding xAI’s Grok chatbot. The company has come under fire after the AI tool was used to alter photographs of women—and in some disturbing cases, underage girls—to create non-consensual lewd images. The backlash prompted the company to suspend image generation for non-subscribers and implement stricter guardrails. However, this intervention arrived only after the California Attorney General launched an investigation and after Grok had already generated tens of thousands of the offending images over several weeks.