Clubhouse Opens Its Doors. Is Anyone Rushing to Get In?

Among early adopters, the most coveted item this time last year was not hand sanitizer or Clorox wipes but a username on Clubhouse, the audio-only social media platform that had Silicon Valley abuzz when it launched in the spring. Access required an invitation from someone already on the app, and these became so in-demand during the lonely months of quarantine that some sold for hundreds of dollars on eBay. Clubhouse was hailed as the future of social media by numerous outlets (including this one) as its waiting list grew to 10 million.

Today, those invitations are worthless: Clubhouse had its long-awaited general release on Wednesday, meaning anyone can now set up an account simply by downloading the app. And yet, the masses don’t seem to be rushing in. The app had 484,000 new installs globally between July 21 and 25, according to analytics group SensorTower. That’s a 17 percent increase from the previous five-day period, mostly coming from outside of the United States. On Apple’s App Store, Clubhouse ranked 10th among apps in the category of free social networking on its first day open to the public—even downloads of Google Duo were higher. On Android, where Clubhouse is newer, it barely cracked the top 20.

For an app that only recently beat out Instagram, TikTok, and WhatsApp in global app stores, that’s a middling debut. In the past, Clubhouse has said that its invite system was key to growing “in a measured way,” onboarding new users in batches and building out features like DMs as needed. Without its exclusivity, though, Clubhouse also seems to have lost some of its hype.

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