Instagram Monthly User Count at 300 Million Passes Twitter

Instagram, the photo-sharing mobile application, now has more users than Twitter Inc. and will improve the quality of its service by deleting fake accounts.

Instagram, owned by Menlo Park, California-based Facebook Inc., said today that its monthly active users rose to 300 million this month from 200 million in March, not counting spammers. That exceeds the 284 million users Twitter said it had in October. Instagram will also begin to verify public figures as well as brands.

It’s been about a year since Instagram started making advertising available. Facebook Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg has been focused on increasing the number of users of the company’s separate mobile apps, including
Instagram, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, before implementing new ways to drive revenue.

“Instagram is adding an average of 360k new active users per day; For comparison Twitter is adding 160k new users per day,” Colin Sebastian, an analyst at Robert W Baird & Co., said today in a tweet.

Twitter declined to comment on Instagram’s announcement. San Francisco-based Twitter has recently been on a campaign to promote its prospects after several quarters of slowing user growth and questions about whether it can ever reach the scale of Facebook, which has about 1.3 billion members. Monthly active user count at Twitter rose 23 percent in the third quarter, down from 24 percent growth the prior quarter.

Verified Accounts

Instagram said that on average its users share 70 million photos per day. About 70 percent of users are now outside the U.S., an increase from 65 percent in March, according to the statement. More than 30 billion photos have now been shared on the app.

When accounts for public figures on Instagram are verified, they will now receive a badge for their authenticity, much like how they do on Twitter and Facebook.

“We’re committed to doing everything possible to keep Instagram free from the fake and spammy accounts that plague much of the Web,” Kevin Systrom, CEO of Instagram, said in a statement today.