Twitter could be about to face its biggest challenge yet. Mark Zuckerberg's Meta has announced it is taking on the popular social media platform in news that's sure to worry it's billionaire owner Elon Musk. The new service, called Threads, will launch on Thursday, July 6 and will offer users the chance to post their thoughts and opinions via their smartphones.
Threads is being described as a "text-based conversation app... where communities come together" and will be linked to users' Instagram accounts.
"Threads is where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics you care about today to what’ll be trending tomorrow," the app states on its description page. "Whatever it is you’re interested in, you can follow and connect directly with your favourite creators and others who love the same things — or build a loyal following of your own to share your ideas, opinions and creativity with the world."
The launch of Threads comes at a tricky time for Twitter with the firm already under fire for charging users to use features that were previously free. This includes accessing the famous blue tick verification which is now only available when people sign up for a premium "Twitter Blue" account.
Musk has also just placed a limit on how many tweets can be read in a day with those who have a free account only able to access 600 posts a day. That number rises to rises to 10,000 with a premium account.
Speaking about the limit Elon Musk said it had been introduced "to address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation".
The new app is the latest chapter in the rivalry between Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, who bought Twitter in October.
Last month the pair - two of the world's most high-profile billionaires - agreed to take each other on in a cage fight in an exchange that went viral on social media.
Those wanting to use Threads should already find it available to pre-order on Apple's App Store.
