Threads edges out X in daily mobile users, new data shows
TL;DR
Threads now surpasses X in daily mobile users with 141.5 million vs. 125 million, driven by Meta's cross-promotion and feature rollout rather than X's controversies. X still leads on web usage with 145.4 million daily visits compared to Threads' 8.5 million.
Key Takeaways
- •Threads has overtaken X in daily mobile active users (141.5M vs. 125M) as of January 2026, marking a significant shift in social media usage patterns.
- •Threads' growth is attributed to Meta's cross-promotion from Facebook/Instagram, focus on creators, and rapid feature additions like communities, DMs, and games.
- •X maintains dominance in web usage with 145.4M daily visits compared to Threads' 8.5M, highlighting different platform strengths.
- •Threads' mobile growth appears driven by long-term strategies rather than reaction to X's controversies involving Grok AI and deepfake investigations.
- •The gap between Threads and X is narrowing in the U.S., where X previously had twice as many daily users a year ago.
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. While X still dominates Threads on the web, the Threads mobile app for iOS and Android has continued to see an increase in daily active users over the past several months.
Similarweb’s data shows that Threads had 141.5 million daily active users on iOS and Android as of January 7, 2026, after months of growth, while X has 125 million daily active users on mobile devices.
This appears to be the result of longer-term trends, rather than a reaction to the recent X controversies, where users were discovered using the platform’s integrated AI, Grok, to create non-consensual nude images of women, including, sometimes minors. Concern around the deepfake images has now prompted California’s attorney general to open an investigation into Grok, following similar investigations by other regions, like the UK, EU, India, Brazil, and many more.
The drama on X also led social networking startup Bluesky to see an increase in app installs in recent days.
Instead, Threads’ boost in daily mobile usage may be driven by other factors, including cross-promotions from Meta’s larger social apps like Facebook and Instagram (where Threads is regularly advertised to existing users), its focus on creators, and the rapid rollout of new features. Over the past year, Threads has added features like interest-based communities, better filters, DMs, long-form text, disappearing posts, and has recently been spotted testing games.
Combined, the daily active user increases suggest that more people are using Threads on mobile as a more regular habit.
According to Meta’s official numbers, the tech giant said in August 2025 that Threads had reached over 400 million monthly active users. The company subsequently reported in October of last year that Threads had 150 million daily active users.
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The growth trends have been continuing for many months. Similarweb last summer reported that Threads was closing the gap with X on mobile devices after seeing 127.8% year-over-year growth as of late June 2025.
Relatedly, Similarweb observed that X is still ahead of Threads in the U.S., but the gap is narrowing. A year ago, X had twice as many daily active users in the U.S. as it does now.
In addition, Threads has little traction on the web while X maintains a fairly steady web audience with around 150 million daily web visits, according to Similarweb data. As of earlier this week (January 13), X was seeing 145.4 million daily web visits, while Threads saw 8.5 million daily web visits across Threads.com and Threads.net combined.
