Meta’s new AI app downloaded in great numbers

Meta Platforms Inc’s new artificial intelligence (AI) agent, Muse, has quickly risen to the top of mobile app charts, a sign that the social media company is gaining traction in the increasingly crowded market for consumer AI assistants.

As of Monday, Muse was ranked the No. 1 free app on the US Apple Inc iOS App and Google Play stores. The app, which is available for people 18 years and older, was downloaded more than 902,000 times since Meta introduced it on Sept. 8, said Abe Yousef, senior insights analyst at Sensor Tower.

That is more than the 773,000 downloads of its predecessor, the Meta AI app, in the same post-launch period, he added.

People are seen behind a logo of Meta Platforms, during a conference in Mumbai, India in 2023.

Photo: Reuters

Muse is available within Meta-owned WhatsApp, indicating it might have even more users beyond the number of standalone app downloads.

Muse lets people create customized AI agents, tools that can be sent out to the Web to complete digital tasks on a user’s behalf. The key difference between Muse and the older Meta AI is Muse’s ability to respond based on users’ social content like Facebook Marketplace and Instagram, as well as to connect to third-party services such as Gmail, Apple and Google calendars, OpenTable or other Web sites via a browser.

By contrast, the free Meta AI app, released in April, focuses on image and short-video generation and offers a less personalized experience. Muse is free to use within limits, but a US$20 or US$100 per month subscription comes with more weekly tokens.

“Meta has a hit on its hands with Muse,” Evercore ISI analysts wrote in a note on Monday. “It amounts to a very tangible sign of successful product innovation” and is evidence that Meta’s US$200 billion AI investments “have not been in vain.”

The user trends suggest “a potentially very dramatic new driver of usage and engagement for Meta” and could bring “substantial new monetization opportunities for Meta in the form of advertising, subscriptions and transaction revenue-share,” the analysts added.

Shares of Meta jumped 11 percent on Monday, reaching its highest close since October last year. The percentage gain was its biggest since April last year.

The early success of Muse has helped lift the stocks of some of Meta’s key suppliers, particularly makers of microprocessors. Advanced Micro Devices Inc surged almost 10 percent, pushing its market value above US$1 trillion. Intel Corp rose 12 percent and Arm Holdings PLC soared 17 percent.

However, the burst of exuberance triggered by strong early uptake of Meta’s AI agent fizzled during the Asia session yesterday as oil resumed its role in setting the tone for markets, with Brent heading for its first gain in a week. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) erased 1.8 percent in gains. South Korean memory giant SK Hynix Inc retreated 1.5 percent.