Meta’s Muse AI app has climbed to second place on the US iPhone App Store, but its early performance remains well below the launches of Threads, Meta AI and ChatGPT.
Muse has been downloaded more than 83,000 times on iOS in the United States, according to data from market intelligence firm Sensor Tower. The app is currently available only in the US.
The figures put Muse behind several recent consumer app launches from Meta. Threads recorded more than 4.3 million US downloads on its first day, while the Meta AI app attracted about 108,000 downloads during its debut.
ChatGPT also gained users at a faster rate when it was initially released in the US. It passed 500,000 installations in less than a week, equivalent to an average of roughly 83,300 downloads a day if spread evenly across that period.
Muse’s position on Apple’s App Store has nevertheless improved since its launch, rising from fourth place to second. That suggests the app may still be gathering momentum rather than suffering an immediate failure.
The Android version has made less progress, ranking 338th in Google Play’s Productivity category. Download figures for Android were not immediately available.
Sensor Tower’s estimates do not include people using Muse through the web or WhatsApp, meaning the total number of users may be higher than the iOS figures indicate.
The launch is an important test of Meta’s strategy to make so-called agentic AI a mainstream consumer product. Muse is designed to carry out tasks on a user’s behalf, reflecting the company’s belief that AI assistants will increasingly do more than answer questions or generate content.
Meta is competing in a growing market that includes Google’s Gemini Spark and Anthropic’s Claude Cowork, as well as Instinct, a text-based AI agent that has attracted significant backing and was recently valued at $2.5 billion.
Instinct has been expanding rapidly, adding features including email accounts, Stripe and 1Password integrations, location sharing and tools allowing users’ agents to communicate with one another when organising plans.
Muse’s initial figures may also have been affected by concerns about privacy. The service requires users to provide Meta with more personal information, while its release came shortly after the company agreed to an $18 billion multistate settlement relating to allegations over the harms caused by social media.
Meta’s wider history of data scandals, privacy disputes and regulatory action could make some consumers more cautious about adopting an assistant with access to personal information, even as the company seeks to establish itself in the next phase of consumer AI.
