Bluesky attracts millions as users leave Musk's X after Trump win

Bluesky is now seeing an influx of new users as millions of users quit X after Donald Trump’s win and a change in their terms.

Social media platform Bluesky is adding millions of users as people flee X after Donald Trump was elected U.S. President and as an upcoming change to the terms of service threatens to complicate legal challenges for the Elon Musk-owned platform.

Bluesky has gained about 2.5 million new users in the past week, raising its total users to more than 16 million, it said on Thursday. It is among a slew of apps looking to replace the platform formerly known as Twitter after Musk's takeover.

"We're seeing record-high activity levels across all different forms of engagement: likes, follows, new accounts, etc, and we're on track to add 1 million new users in one day alone," Bluesky said in a statement.

Several well-known organizations and personalities, including the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate, British news publisher the Guardian and former CNN anchor Don Lemon have said they were leaving X due to concerns about the platform's content and the looming terms change.

X was called out by misinformation experts during the election for playing a central role in enabling the spread of false information about the critical battleground states.

On Nov. 6, as news broke that Musk ally Trump won the presidency, X attracted 46.5 million visits in the U.S. - more than any day in the past year and 38% higher than an average day in recent months, according to analytics firm SimilarWeb.

But more than 115,000 U.S. web visitors deactivated their X accounts – the most since Musk bought the platform, SimilarWeb data showed.