Report: Meta Plans to Add Advertising to Threads

Meta reportedly plans to add advertising to its social media platform, Threads.

The company’s Instagram ad unit is spearheading the initiative, and a small number of advertisers will be allowed to publish on the app beginning in January, Seeking Alpha reported Wednesday (Nov. 13), citing a paywalled article from The Information.

Reached by PYMNTS, a Meta company spokesperson said in an emailed statement: “Since our priority is to build consumer value first and foremost, there are no ads or monetization features currently on Threads.”

Threads was built by Meta’s Instagram team and launched in July 2023 as a text-based social media platform. It picked up more than 175 million monthly active users in its first year.

“Our vision with Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas,” Meta said in a press release announcing the launch.

In an Oct. 30 earnings report, Meta said its total advertising-related revenues came in at $39.9 billion in the third quarter, compared to $33.6 billion last year. The company’s ad impressions grew 7% year over year, where those growth rates had been as high as 21% a year ago.

The Information’s report of future ads on Threads came a day after Meta announced it was lowering the price of ad-free subscriptions for European Union users of two of its other social media platforms, Instagram and Facebook.

“Going forward, people based in the EU will still have the option to choose between subscribing for an ad-free experience or continuing to access our services for free,” the company said in a Tuesday (Nov. 12) blog post. “For those people who choose to continue using our services for free, they’ll now also be able to choose to see less personalized ads. However, we remain committed to personalized advertising, which will always be the cornerstone of a free and inclusive internet.”

Meta launched its ad-free subscription offering last year to comply with EU regulations and launched an additional option in response to regulators’ demands “that go beyond what is written in the law,” the company said in the post.