Brazil accounted for 85% of Bluesky global users during X ban

Bluesky, the social media platform co-created by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, has long been touted as the next big thing in the world of microblogging. But after a year of operating as an invite-only platform — and opening to the public this year — Bluesky has failed to challenge big brothers X and Threads, despite users of both platforms constantly voicing their displeasure with how they work.

Then, the Brazilian Supreme Court enforced a ban on X that lasted five weeks.

For months, the platform owned by Elon Musk waged a war of attrition with Brazil’s top court, refusing to block users who were posting criminal content. In April 2024, Justice Alexandre de Moraes — who oversees multiple investigations into disinformation rings — placed Mr. Musk under investigation for obstruction of justice, incitation of criminal activity, and the “willful criminal instrumentalization” of X.

The feud reached a breaking point when X shuttered its Brazilian office, hoping to dodge subpoenas and unpaid fines. By the end of August, Justice Moraes banned X in Brazil, saying it failed to respect the country’s laws — a decision later upheld by his peers.

With X offline, Brazilian users flocked to Bluesky. According to web analytics firm Similarweb, Bluesky’s active Brazilian user base surged from fewer than 50,000 pre-ban to over 7.2 million. The data accounts for Android users, the vastly predominant operating system on Brazilian smartphones.

According to the Similarweb data, 85 percent of all Bluesky’s global users were in Brazil — making Portuguese the platform’s dominant language by far.

Threads also saw an increase in active Brazilian users, but the spike was far less dramatic.

As Nataliya Ilyushina, a research fellow at RMIT University, wrote, Bluesky looks similar to X but stands apart because of its decentralized framework. Built on an open-source system known as the AT Protocol, Bluesky allows outsiders to see how the platform is developed and gives users more control over their social media experience — something that neither X nor Threads offer.

Since Mr. Musk took over X, the platform has been widely criticized for fostering hate speech. The Anti-Defamation League and the Center for Countering Digital Hate both reported a threefold increase in racial slurs following Mr. Musk’s acquisition in October 2022. The Institute of Strategic Dialogue also found a doubling of anti-Semitic content.

Many believe the social media platform’s environment will become even more toxic after an update that will allow users to view other people’s posts even if they are blocked. In the wake of that change, Bluesky announced more than 100,000 new signups, which strained its servers.

“We saw some growth in [Bluesky active users] in countries like the United Kingdom, but nothing as huge as in Brazil,” says David Carr, a Similarweb spokesperson and editor.

“At its peak [in Brazil], the BlueSky app actually had more daily active users than X did prior to the ban,” Mr. Carr tells The Brazilian Report. “That’s partly people entering the platform for the first time — but also users who already had accounts but were just signing in that much more often.”

In our September 24 Brazil Daily newsletter, Elizabeth Saad, a professor at the University of São Paulo specializing in social media studies, told reporter Isabela Cruz that there was a non-negligible chance that the Bluesky migration could become permanent for many users.

It has been nine days since X was cleared for Brazilian users — after the company decided to comply with judicial requests.

While X usage skyrocketed — as expected — and the Musk-owned platform regained its leading position in Brazil, Bluesky still has 2.72 million users. “It’d be interesting to see whether this has a lasting impact on how popular they become in the long run,” Mr. Carr ponders.

Even if Bluesky’s numbers decline, its trajectory could mirror that of Telegram. When WhatsApp faced multiple suspensions in Brazil in 2019, Telegram saw a surge in users. Although WhatsApp still reigns supreme, Telegram transitioned from a niche app to one installed on two-thirds of Brazilian smartphones.

In any case, Bluesky has found a foothold among progressives. Two publishers of independent media outlets have told The Brazilian Report that they are abandoning X altogether, mentioning that news content is being better distributed on Bluesky, sparking more reader engagement and traffic to their platform.

Even those that will remain on X are unwilling to abandon Bluesky — The Brazilian Report is one of them.