Twitter's renaming as X saw its weekly active users drop

Twitter's renaming as X by Elon Musk saw its weekly active users drop 4 per cent over the following weeks after the exercise. The X app fell four spots in the Overall category rankings to No 36 earlier this month as its installs decreased by 8 per cent, according to data from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower. That included a decline across both iOS and Android, down 22 per cent and 18 per cent, respectively.

Average user time spent and sessions on X fell 5 per cent after the rebranding. “Twitter rebranded to X earlier this week and saw mixed reactions from its users with some notably voicing dissatisfaction with the abandonment of the classic blue bird logo,” said the report. However, installs for the Twitter Lite app, designed for emerging markets, went up after the name change, reports TechCrunch, citing the data.

Twitter Lite downloads increased, up 50 per cent from the previous time frame. From August 6 through August 20, revenue also substantially jumped by 25 per cent, primarily driven by revenue from iOS (up 24 per cent).

The X rebrand additionally impacted other apps, like rivals Bluesky, Instagram Threads and Mastodon. In the first week (July 23-August 5) of the rebranding exercise, Meta's Threads downloads dropped 70 per cent, leaving the app ranked 16th Overall. But Bluesky and Mastodon saw downloads increase by 180 per cent and 15 per cent, respectively, according to the Sensor Tower data.