Bluesky’s active user base is shrinking as its focus expands beyond the app
Decentralized social network Bluesky was one of the bigger beneficiaries of the exodus from Elon Musk’s X in November 2024, following the U.S. elections. But
Decentralized social network Bluesky was one of the bigger beneficiaries of the exodus from Elon Musk’s X in November 2024, following the U.S. elections. But now, nearly two years later, the social network and would-be X competitor is struggling to hold onto its momentum. According to data from digital intelligence provider Similarweb, Bluesky’s mobile app had 10.4 million monthly active users worldwide in June 2026, down 27.2% year-over-year. In addition, mobile daily active users continued to decline, falling 25.6% year-over-year in July to around 3 million. Image Credits:Similarweb These declines indicate that even though Bluesky’s app continues to add registered accounts, fewer people are using its mobile app on a regular basis. It also suggests that some of those who joined Bluesky due to their dissatisfaction with X post-elections haven’t stuck around long-term. But the bigger takeaway here is not just that Bluesky’s post-election bump has shrunk.
Bluesky’s app has lost more than half its monthly active users from its late-2024 high, which means that its app usage continued to shrink even after the initial post-election surge subsided. (Its quarterly average was around 22.1 million monthly active users in the fourth quarter of 2024, Similarweb’s data indicates, and it declined to 10.7 million in the second quarter of 2026. That’s a decline of around 52%.) Building beyond Bluesky While Bluesky’s numbers are down, those who stuck around are committed. Its smaller community remains relatively active, with a stickiness rate (the ratio of daily to monthly active users) of roughly 29% in June, about the same as Threads. For Bluesky’s new CEO, Toni Schneider, these numbers may not be as concerning. The company is not entirely focused on making Bluesky (the app) succeed, but on making it possible for the underlying protocol (AT Proto) to power a growing number of social apps, services, and communities.
That’s something that is now taking place, as projects like BlackSky and Eurosky are growing, while some AT Proto apps like the video-focused Skylight have found early traction, too. In addition, the company has launched new products, like the AI-powered research tool Attie, and is now working on adding support for private data to Bluesky. The latter could generate new interest in Bluesky from a different type of user — those less interested in the public square, and more interested in private networking and communities. Bluesky’s Attie Image Credits:Bluesky (screenshot) What’s more, Similarweb’s data doesn’t necessarily suggest that Bluesky users have returned to X, as some may have feared. Instead, the data shows that X’s worldwide monthly active users on mobile were down around 3% year-over-year in June, and X’s mobile daily active users dropped 7% in July to 123.7 million. (Of course, X remains a sizable social network with around 302 million monthly active users on its app as of June 2026 and a growing number of web visits, up 5.3% year-over-year in July to 4.7 billion.) If anything, the app to now be concerned about is Threads.
The BriefWire