Threads smashes ChatGPT's record as millions throng to Twitter rival app

The newly-launched app, Threads, smashed Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool ChatGPT's record as millions of users thronged to join the Twitter rival app, data tracking websites noted on Monday.

The Meta-owned platform having a familiar layout resembling the microblogging site, became the fastest-growing consumer app after over 100 million sign-ups in less than five days of the launch.

As per the data, ChatGPT took two months to hit the 100 million user mark, while video-sharing app TikTok took nine months.

Unlike Threads — whose most of the users are Instagram users — the picture and video sharing site managed to attract a hundred million users in two-and-a-half years since its launch in 2010.

The new app went live on Apple and Android app stores in 100 countries late on Wednesday, though it is not available in Europe because parent company Meta is unsure how to navigate the European Union's data privacy legislation.

Twitter is thought to have around 200 million regular users, but it has suffered repeated technical failures since Elon Musk bought the platform last year and sacked thousands of staff.

Musk, who also serves as the boss of Tesla and SpaceX, has also alienated many users by introducing charges for previously free services and allowing banned right-wing accounts back on the platform.

Several rivals have emerged, but most are niche platforms without the capacity to grow at the necessary scale to dethrone Twitter.

Threads is finding it easier because it is linked to Instagram, which has more than one billion regular users.

Online data service Quiver Quantitative reported that the app passed 100 million users at 0700 GMT on Monday.

Other websites using a count of the "badges" received by Instagram users who have downloaded Threads reckoned the mark had passed earlier.

Musk has threatened to sue Meta for stealing trade secrets and intellectual property, claims denied by the company, which also owns Facebook and WhatsApp.

Musk is locked in a rivalry with Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg, with the two men calling each other out for a cage fight recently.