Elon Musk's Twitter 2.0 Subscriber Count Will Surprise You — It's Way Less Than You Think

Elon Musk’s decision to monetize the Twitter Blue subscription created several controversies but has attracted significantly fewer people than the billionaire might have anticipated. 

What Happened: As of mid-January 2023, approximately 180,000 people in the U.S. are paying for subscriptions to the microblogging site. This includes Twitter Blue subscribers. 

This is less than 0.2% of monthly active users on the platform, reported The Information, citing a document viewed by them.  

See Also: Elon Musk Dubs Twitter’ PvP Of Social Media’

According to the document, the U.S. has 62% of Twitter’s total global subscribers, which implies that the platform has 290,000 subscribers worldwide. 

The site charges $8 per month for Blue Verified users on the web and $11/per month for users signing up via Apple Inc.‘s AAPL iOS device, although the Cupertino-based tech giant bags 30% of that fee. 

Simply put, Twitter’s lackluster growth in attracting users willing to pay for subscription services may pose a challenge for Musk, who wanted to turn the Twitter Blue subscription model into a major source of revenue, the report noted. 

Why It’s Important: The aforementioned numbers of Twitter subscribers tally from the statement Travis Brown, a software developer in Berlin, gave in January. He said the Twitter Blue subscriber count “hasn’t even doubled” a month after relaunch. 

According to Brown, the second inning of the Twitter Blue launch attracted “somewhere between 275K and 325K subscribers in total.”

Despite all the roadblocks, Twitter has propelled itself to the number one spot for “U.S. News” in the Apple App Store ranking. 

Read Next: Elon Musk Says Bots With ‘Good Content’ Can Use Twitter API Days After Revoking Free Access