Social networking startup Bluesky has benefited from a surge in new users from the UK following Elon Musk's controversial comments about the UK riots in recent weeks. While X's biggest rival, Instagram Threads, has yet to show any defections from X in its app install or usage data, Bluesky said earlier this week that it has seen an increase in sign-ups and a 60% increase in activity from UK-based accounts. The company reiterated the claim on Wednesday, showing a chart showing that UK activity on its network now outpaces all other countries on Bluesky.
Image credit: Bluesky
The company also noted Tuesday that the UK drove more Bluesky registrations than any other country in five of the past seven days.
Despite the UK users flocking to decentralized social networking apps and alternatives to X, other new data suggests that Meta's Threads, rather than Bluesky, is a better option to compete with the Musk-owned social network (formerly known as Twitter).
Image credit: Similarweb
New analysis from digital market intelligence firm Similarweb suggests the impact of UK-based users joining Bluesky is still fairly small.
On August 11, Blue Sky hit 67,800 daily active users in the UK. While this is a recent peak, it's not the highest usage the company has seen from UK users to date — in January of this year, for example, Blue Sky's app had over 100,000 daily active users, so the company said this recent spike isn't as notable in the broader context.
Additionally, Bluesky's UK-based monthly active users remained stable from June to July, while Threads' UK-based monthly active users increased slightly by 8.6% (although overall, the company previously reported that fluctuations in daily and weekly usage for X were still within normal ranges, despite reports of users fleeing the app).
Meanwhile, the impact of this UK-led change on X has been disappointing: August 11 was one of X's lowest revenue days this year, according to SimilarWeb, but the Musk-owned app still has 6 million daily active users from the UK, far more than Threads and Bluesky, according to the data.
Image credit: Similarweb
Generally speaking, X's user base tends to fluctuate, but monthly active users from June to July increased by 2.6% in the UK and 3.4% in the US. However, the stabbing incident that sparked the UK riots fuelled by online misinformation occurred near the end of July, so it may not be the best period to analyze, but Musk's comments in August infuriated X users and UK authorities.
Still, a Similarweb analysis of worldwide Android data shows that X still has a big lead over Threads and Bluesky, with 91 million daily active users worldwide compared to 34.9 million for Threads and 594,700 for Bluesky as of August 12. On the web, X.com had 192.5 million daily web visits as of August 12 compared to 3.7 million for Threads and 616,200 for Bluesky.
That said, X's lead is bigger in the US than in the UK.
X is 5.9x larger than Threads in the US and just over 3x larger in the UK in terms of monthly active users. This small difference could make it easier for competitors like Bluesky and Threads to capture the UK user base if switching trends grow over time.