Another day, another third party report showing that X usage is in decline.

Today, Edison Research has published its annual Infinite Dial report, which provides a snapshot of media trends, based on a survey of over 1,000 people in the U.S. aged 12 and older.

Which, of course, is only a small fraction of the total population, but the Infinite Dial report has long been a solid indicator of emerging trends, and a good resource for understanding key attention shifts.

And clearly, based on this data at least, attention is shifting away from X (formerly Twitter).

As you can see from this overview, the rate of people indicating that they’re using X has declined by 30% year-over-year.

The overall user numbers here are U.S. only, and are extrapolated from the responses. For context, X reported that it was seeing 46 million U.S. mDAU in November 2022, though the figures above could also relate to monthly estimates.

But seemingly, based on overall responses, X has seen a 30% decline in interest.

Which aligns with various other third party reports, including:

• Apptopia reported in October last year that X has seen a 13% decline in daily active users since Musk took over at the app. Apptopia’s data suggests that the re-brand to X accelerated this decline.
• SimilarWeb has reported that X has seen a 14% decline in mobile and web visits since September 2022.
• AppAnnie’s 2023 “State of Mobile” report found that X’s monthly active user count declined significantly between 2022 and 2023.
• Last month, Sensor Tower reported that X usage has declined 18% year-over-year. X refuted this, but offered no data to clarify.

X’s own data shows that its usage has been pretty much flat, with X recently reporting that it has 250 million daily active users, the same amount that it had in November 2022, shortly after Elon took the reigns at the app.

So really, one way or another, X is not growing, which is not a great sign for Elon’s social media project.

Should that make it any less of a consideration for ad partners?

Well, it depends on your audience. If the people you want to reach are active on X, then you should probably consider running X ads, and seeing what kinds of results you get.

But the swing away from X doesn’t bode well for its growth potential, nor for its capacity to lure big name advertisers, who clearly want to maximize reach and resonance.

Reports suggest that many of these brands are still staying away from the app, with X’s overall ad revenue still down by around 60% versus when Elon took over at the app, though Elon did recently note that the vast majority of advertisers are coming back to the app.

In essence, the overall trends are not as important as your own audience engagement focus, and where the people you want to reach are at. But the numbers do suggest that X is becoming a more niche consideration in this respect.

Edison’s Infinite Dial report also includes this interesting overview of the development of the social media landscape.

2007 was a simpler time, while we didn’t know what we had in Vine till it was too late.

Some interesting notes on the modern social media landscape, and key usage trends.

You can check out the full Infinite Dial 2024 report here.