As of mid-January, about 180,000 people in the U.S. were paying for Twitter subscriptions, according to a document seen by The Information, with less than 0.2 percent of the total number of monthly active users (and that’s not the only kind of paid user) being Twitter Blue Label certified.
That tiny number shows the challenge Elon Musk faces in turning the subscription product into Twitter’s main source of revenue.
The document says that the number of U.S. users is about 62 percent of Twitter’s global user base, which means Twitter has at least 290,000 paid subscribers worldwide.
Twitter currently charges $8 per month for its “Blue Verified” users (currently about $54), and $11 per month for those who sign up through Apple iOS (Apple charges an additional 30 percent).
In addition, there is word that Twitter will offer businesses a “Gold Verified” for $1,000 per month, and that if they refuse to pay they will lose their existing Gold Verified, but the exact timing of the policy is unknown.
Twitter has faced a rough patch since Elon Musk bought the company for $44 billion last year. in January 2023, Twitter’s daily revenue fell 40 percent year-over-year, and hundreds of Twitter’s top advertisers have stopped or scaled back spending. One company estimates that Twitter’s ad revenue fell by as much as 70 percent year-over-year in December.
In a November tweet, Elon Musk acknowledged that the company had suffered a “significant drop in revenue” after advertisers suspended spending on the social media platform. In late 2022, Elon Musk claimed on an episode of the All-In podcast that Twitter was no longer “on the fast track to bankruptcy,” but that it was still not “safe.
Under Elon Musk’s management, Twitter cut staff through massive layoffs and internal changes that forced many people to quit, including ending the work-from-home forever policy that was in place during former CEO Jack Dorsey’s time.
In addition to cutting costs, the company is trying to create new revenue streams. In addition to the Twitter Blue subscription service, he auctioned off everything from kitchen supplies to office equipment in January of this year.
