Bluesky Boom: X Alternative Sees Surge Of Signups

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One of the top downloads in the iOS App Store is not like the others. Bluesky, the decentralized , now ranks fourth among as of Oct. 18–-behind Meta's , , and Google, but ahead of and .

In comparison, X's app ranks 29th on that leaderboard. In the , Bluesky ranks second—behind Threads and ahead of WhatsApp, Facebook, and Telegram. X doesn't show up in that category but does rank as the top free news app. That may seem like an odd classification, but Pew Research Center data shows —and remain wary of the .

As for Android, Bluesky currently ranks 39th among free apps in the U.S. Play Store, while X is 43rd. Bluesky also ranks fifth among social apps after Threads, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, followed by X. 

A surge of signups seems to be propelling all of these app installs, with Bluesky's official account . A suggests the total user count is now nearing 12 million.

Those would be strong growth numbers for any social platform, but Bluesky seems one of the least likely candidates for a boom like this. Not only is it competing with a platform owned by the richest man in the world, it aimed at building a decentralized social network on open protocols. Until February, Bluesky , and it's been playing catchup in adding popular Twitter features like , and .

Bluesky does, however, offer certain features that are notably absent from competing platforms, such as instead of feeds dictated by a centralized and force-fed algorithm (Threads, we're ), independent verification by , and the ability to move your entire account and identity .

Bluesky also has one feature that X can't add: It's not subject to , which in recent weeks has seen him , , and and will no longer hide your posts from people you block.

A warning that looks like the most obvious spur for this burst of Bluesky signups. That, in turn, seems the biggest boost to Bluesky since in August after an escalating standoff between Musk and investigators of the January 2023 coup attempt launched by supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro. 

Bluesky's user numbers remain a small fraction of those of X and Threads. In July, third-party data suggested X's daily active user total had stalled , while Threads head Adam Mosseri posted in September that the platform .

The federated alternative , meanwhile, counts across its archipelago of "instances" but now appears to be growing much more slowly than Bluesky.

All of these short-form social outlets, meanwhile, . In January, the Pew Research Center reported that only 22% of U.S. adults used X, with none of its alternatives even showing up in . In comparison, 83% of U.S. adults were on YouTube, 68% on Facebook, and 47% were on Instagram.