Bluesky, a social networking startup, has seen a significant increase in new users from the U.K. in response to Elon Musk’s recent controversial statements regarding the U.K. riots. Despite no visible exodus from its biggest rival, Instagram Threads, Bluesky has reported a surge in signups and a 60% rise in activity from U.K.-based accounts. The company showcased a chart displaying a spike in U.K. activity on its network, surpassing all other countries currently.
Bluesky also reported that the U.K. drove more signups than any other country for five out of the last seven days.
However, new data suggests that Meta’s Threads, not Bluesky, may have a better chance at challenging X, the social network formerly known as Twitter, despite the influx of U.K. users to Bluesky.
An analysis from Similarweb shows that the impact of U.K.-based users on Bluesky is still relatively small. Although there was a recent peak of 67,800 U.K.-based daily active users on August 11, it was not the highest number of daily active users Bluesky has seen from the U.K. The U.K.-based monthly active users for Bluesky remained unchanged from June to July.
Despite the initial surge, Threads saw an 8.6% increase in monthly active users in the U.K., suggesting that X is still ahead of the competition in terms of user base.
Similarweb’s Android data show that X continues to lead with 91.0 million global daily active users, compared to 34.9 million for Threads and 594,700 for Bluesky on August 12. On the web, X.com had 192.5 million daily web visits, while Threads and Bluesky had significantly fewer.
Despite X’s dominance, Bluesky and Threads may have a chance to win over the U.K. demographic if the trend continues to grow over time.