Despite Elon Musk's assertions that X is achieving record highs in usage every other month and remains a vital platform for connection, recent data reveals a waning interest among users, largely influenced by Musk's own controversial comments.

New insights show a significant drop in users in both the U.S. and U.K. over recent months, coinciding with Musk's increasing political rhetoric. Last month, in response to reports of race-related riots in the U.K., Musk controversially tweeted that "civil war is inevitable," which appears to have triggered an exodus of U.K. users from the platform.

According to data from Similarweb, active daily users in the U.K. have plummeted from 8 million a year ago to approximately 5.6 million now, with more than a third of that decline occurring since the summer riots. This trend is mirrored in other regions as well, not just in countries where the app has been banned, like Brazil. Over the same 16-month period, X has seen a roughly 20% decrease in active users in the U.S.

This decline also aligns with X’s own reports regarding its EU user base. In its latest update, covering the first half of 2024, X disclosed a 5% drop in users in the European Union, as required by its reporting obligations.

X is losing users in key markets, including a significant number in Brazil, where it remains banned but could potentially have restrictions lifted soon. Despite this decline, Elon Musk continues to assert that X is experiencing growth.

Much of this perception stems from selective reporting. For instance, Musk has claimed that X has become the top news app in several regions. However, this is misleading; X (formerly Twitter) has held the title of the number one news app since 2016 when it reclassified itself from "social media" to "news." This ranking primarily results from the fact that many dedicated news apps have far fewer users. With around 250 million daily active users, X naturally outperforms these apps, but it is fundamentally a social media platform reliant on user-generated content, which disqualifies it from being classified as a news app in the Google Play Store.

Elon is now emphasizing "user seconds" as a key metric for measuring X’s performance. He recently stated that usage hit an all-time high with 417 billion user-seconds globally, and in the U.S., user-seconds reached 93 billion—23% higher than the previous record of 76 billion.

However, many of these claims have been questioned, as X has reported inflated usage statistics under varying parameters. It appears that the "active seconds" metric only reflects data since the rebranding to X, rather than all-time figures from the Twitter era. Consequently, these numbers may lack context and significance, especially given the shifting parameters of X's reporting.

Moreover, every third-party measurement provider has reported a decline in X's user base, making it difficult to believe that the platform is outperforming these analyses, especially with the company’s revenue also declining.

Overall, it’s reasonable to conclude that Elon Musk's X project is struggling, and features like the Grok AI chatbot have yet to reverse this downward trend. At some point, X may need to confront its long-term viability, which could lead to the end of the project altogether.

I also suspect that the outcome of the upcoming U.S. election will significantly impact X’s future. If Trump loses, it could be a substantial setback for Musk, who has invested much of his hopes in a Trump victory. Trump's re-election would create a direct link to the White House for Musk, potentially allowing him to reshape policies in favor of his companies, especially SpaceX, which often faces regulatory hurdles.

Such a scenario could also benefit X and Musk's other ventures. Conversely, a victory for Harris would eliminate these potential advantages. If Trump doesn’t win, Musk might have to reevaluate some of his initiatives, and given X’s current performance, it could face shutdown or sale.

Ultimately, Musk seems to be banking on his popularity influencing the election, using X as a platform for that purpose. If this strategy fails, the app may lose its significance for him.