A year ago, Instagram was still a punchy start-up, used primarily as a repository for soft-filtered photos of farmers’ markets and the Brooklyn Bridge. Today, it’s bigger than Twitter.
According to AllThingsD, which got its hands on an early copy of ComScore’s latest mobile audience report, Instagram topped Twitter’s number of daily active users for the first time in August, with 7.3 million users logging on daily as opposed to Twitter’s 6.868 million. Instagrammers also spent more time on the site than Twitter users, an average of 257 minutes in August versus 170 minutes for Twitter users.
Instagram’s dominance isn’t complete. Twitter still had more unique U.S. visitors to its site from smartphones in August, and it’s much more dominant in certain realms. (You don’t see Instagram credited with sparking uprisings in the Middle East, for example.)
But the rapid growth and user engagement of Instagram is a vote of confidence for Facebook, which was accused of having overpaid for the site in a $1 billion acquisition back in April. And as large corporations look to Instagram for advertising inspiration, it’s clear that the site has grown beyond its brunch-and-bridges roots.
Now all Facebook has to do is hone its own mobile app, which has lagged expectations and frustrated users. Luckily, the company now has an in-house example to follow.
