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The Threads app has appeared in the App Store

This is a good time for Instagram to step into the fray.

Rumored to compete with Twitter, Instagram’s Threads just hit the US iOS app store and Google Play in select countries. According to the App Store, its launch is expected on July 6th.

This is a good time for Instagram to step into the fray. Twitter has been battling frantically with bugs over the past weekend due to rate limits, with competitors such as Spill, Bluesky and Post posting significant growth. But Threads may have an advantage over them as it directly transfers followers and lists from Instagram. Instead of building a community from scratch, Threads users will get their existing social circles from Instagram right from the start.

“Threads is a place where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics that excite you today to what will be in trend tomorrow,” the App Store description says. “Whatever interests you, you can follow and connect directly with your favorite authors and other people who love the same thing – or create your own loyal audience to share your ideas, opinions and creativity with the world.”

While Threads is closely related to Instagram, it will be a separate app. We don’t have much information yet and it comes from an App Store listing, but it looks like users will be able to like, comment, repost, and share. You can also see in the App Store screenshots that you can choose which audience can reply to your posts – everyone, those you follow, or only those mentioned in the post.

However, the announcement of Threads is nothing new, as details about the app have slowly leaked out over the past few months. According to one source, an Instagram spokesperson described Threads as a “decentralized” social network. And in leaked slides from the lead creator briefing, Meta* stated that Threads will be compatible with Mastodon, which is hosted on the ActivityPub decentralized network. But if Threads is part of Instagram, a very centralized app, that doesn’t make much sense – we’ll see how this rumor turns out. Other rumors, however, have all but come true – every detail in the App Store listing is consistent with what we’ve learned from the leaked slides.

Spin-off Meta applications have not always been successful. Over the past few years, the company has shut down products such as the anonymous teen app tbh, the Cameo-like Super app, the Nextdoor Neighborhoods clone, the Tuned couples app, the student-focused social network Campus, the video dating service Sparked, and others. But Threads is launching at the perfect time to take advantage of Twitter’s constant disruptions. However, consumers will have to decide if they want Meta to manage yet another aspect of their social media communications.