X formerly known as Twitter is facing a sharp revenue squeeze, largely driven by a dramatic drop in Android installations of its app. July 2025 brought a staggering 44% year-over-year decline in new installs on Google Play, while iOS downloads surprisingly surged by 15% over the same period. Though iOS growth offered a brief respite, overall mobile downloads were still down 26%, an improvement over June’s 35% dip, but still a red flag.
This decline isn’t just about vanity metrics. It’s hitting X’s subscription revenue hard. In July, X pulled in $16.9 million, down from $18.8 million in March 2025 even though this was marginally better than June’s low of $16.8 million. With Android still commanding a majority share of global smartphone usage, neglecting this segment is not just an oversight, it’s a strategic misstep.
X’s head of product, Nikita Bier, known for her success with teen-centric viral apps like Gas and TBH, has publicly acknowledged the problem. She’s launching an “Android Dream Team” to rebuild the app, while spotlighting record-breaking iOS install weeks to soften the blow. But talk doesn’t fix buggy code—users do. And loyalty is fleeting.
Meanwhile, some Android users appear to be drifting to alternatives: Meta’s Threads is gaining ground, and although Bluesky remains far behind, its growth hints at an audience looking for stability and reliability.
What worries me is that X seems to be choosing optics over substance. Posting record iOS install figures while ignoring a disintegrating Android experience is tone-deaf especially since Android represents the backbone of global user growth. Furthermore, X’s premium AI chatbot, Grok, is now a standalone app, potentially cannibalizing subscription revenue that used to run through the main platform.
Beyond install numbers, things are getting structurally worse. X’s overall user engagement is slipping. Sensor Tower reports a 10% drop in daily active users in Q2 2025. At the same time, Threads is surging with 127.8% year-over-year growth, reaching 115 million daily mobile users, with X only slightly ahead at 132 million but bleeding growth.
It’s a textbook example of how platform decay unfolds, not with catastrophic failure, but through a thousand small cuts. The absence of Android focus isn’t just technical negligence, it’s a drain on the entire ecosystem. If X can’t reclaim trust and reliability on the world’s most widely used mobile OS, there’s no plan B that can save it.
In my view, the company is at a pivotal moment. Rebuilding the Android app isn’t optional—it’s existential. That alone won’t be enough. X must reimagine how it serves the vast majority of its users who don’t live in Apple’s ecosystem.
A truly resilient X would restore core functionality, build trust through consistent performance, and synchronize premium features like Grok across platforms without fragmenting its value. Until then, slipping Android installs and subscriptions aren’t just metrics, they’re warning signals. I’d argue they’re a far better sign of health than any record-breaking iOS week.
