Analysts have seen a drop in the number of daily users on the social media network X, which Elon Musk purchased more than a year ago. Since the renaming, the firm has introduced several substantial modifications, such as audio calls, a subscription service, and the Tesla billionaire’s Grok AI tool for premium customers.
Since November 2022, the first month of Musk’s ownership, the number of US users has either remained constant or decreased every month, according to market research firm Sensor Tower, located in San Francisco. Globally, the situation is almost as dire, with 174 million daily active users on the mobile app in February—a 15% decrease from the previous year.
During the same period, other social media platforms reported tiny increases in their global user bases: Facebook saw a 1.5% rise, Instagram saw a 5.3% increase, Snapchat saw an 8.8% increase, and TikTok had a negligible 0.5% gain. Nevertheless, none of these applications saw a sharp decrease in the US user base as X did.
In a bold statement on Monday, X questioned the numbers provided by Sensor Tower, asserting that the actual number of users globally is closer to 250 million, who utilize the site every day. However, data from app-monitoring firm Sensor Tower shows that since Elon Musk acquired the website and relaunched it as X, Twitter’s US user base has declined by over a fifth. The number of Americans using social networks daily as of February 2024 has decreased by 23% from November 2022—shortly after Musk finished his takeover.
According to Sensor Tower statistics, X performed marginally better globally, losing 15% of its users to 174 million daily active app users. The analytics firm depends on various sources to maintain an accurate panel of people to sample, and it does not follow users who access the social network via desktop programs or the web.
One of the investors in Musk’s takeover of the once publicly listed firm, money manager Fidelity, has made appraisals of the company that show the decline in value.
The blue chip growth fund of Fidelity has consistently deducted value from the firm; from November 2022 to November 2023, the fund’s value decreased by 71.5%.
This is the fund’s most recent low. With Musk having paid $44 billion for his share, Fidelity’s total estimated evaluation for X is now a little over $12.5 billion.