If all the changes and restrictions happening at Twitter are getting too much to bear, you may be in luck. Instagram has a Twitter competitor on the way, and it’s set to arrive on July 6. That’s this Thursday.
Ever since Elon Musk took over Twitter and started making sweeping and controversial changes, the topic of Twitter alternatives has been on a lot of peoples’ minds. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the company was working on its own micro-blogging rival back in March. In the following months we learned it would be called Threads, and would be officially part of Instagram — albeit in a separate app.
It’s because there’s a separate app that we know when Threads is slated to arrive. An Apple App Store listing for the app has just appeared, declaring that Threads is “coming soon” and expected on July 6. A placeholder has also appeared on Google Play, but doesn’t offer any additional details.
The Instagram app also has a teaser that divulges a little bit more. Simply type the phrase “threads” into the search bar, and a ticket icon will appear. Tapping it loads up a spinning virtual ticket revealing Threads will be launching at 10 a.m. ET on July 6. An on-screen QR code also takes you to threads.net when scanned — featuring a countdown to launch day.
According to the App Store Threads is “Instagram’s text-based conversation app”, It’s described as “where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics you care about today to what’ll be trending tomorrow. Whatever it is you’re interested in, you can follow and connect directly with your favorite creators and others who love the same things — or build a loyal following of your own to share your ideas, opinions and creativity with the world.”
Which is more or less Twitter, but with a different billionaire at the helm. And hopefully none of the ridiculous decision-making and paywalls weaken the experience.
Screenshots on the Apple and Google app portals show an interface that should prove familiar to Instagram users. The difference is that text is the dominant thing on screen, rather than images. Though it does look like you’ll be able to use Threads to post images, much as you would on Twitter or in a Facebook status.
Better still it confirms that your Instagram account will carry over, letting you log in with the exact same username and password. This also means you can follow all the same accounts fairly easily, though whether this will be done automatically or not isn’t clear.
If you’re not already an active Instagram user, or take issue with the amount of data Meta apps have been known to collect, then Threads may not be for you. Still in a world where Twitter seems hell-bent on spiralling into oblivion, and alternatives are still very much in their infancy, Meta probably has a decent chance of success.
We’ll have to see how this plays out to see if it can tempt users away from Twitter. But at least you don’t have long to wait to take Threads for a spin yourself.
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