Vibes Boosts Meta AI App To 2.7 Million Daily Users

Meta AI’s launch of Vibes, a short-form AI-generated video feed, coincided with a sharp jump in downloads and daily active users. Similarweb data shows DAUs climbed to 2.7 million by October 17, up from roughly 775,000 a month earlier, while daily downloads rose to about 300,000 from under 200,000. The surge illustrates how a timely product feature can convert curiosity into regular use — and how accessible alternatives benefit when invite-only rivals stoke public interest.

Meta AI’s decision to add a short-form, generative-video feed called Vibes appears to have shifted the app from niche experiment to mainstream engagement driver. In the space of roughly four weeks, the app’s daily active users more than tripled, and downloads climbed substantially, a movement that signals the power of low-friction content formats to quickly convert interest into habit.

How Vibes changed engagement patterns

Vibes introduces a discovery-first, scrollable feed of AI-generated short videos inside the Meta AI app. The feature adds a social and creative layer that text assistants don’t offer — users can browse, consume, and create within the same stream. According to the dataset you shared, daily active users rose to 2.7M by October 17 from approximately 775K a month earlier; daily downloads increased to about 300K from under 200K in the same window. For context, the app recorded around 4,000 daily downloads on October 17, 2024 — underscoring how quickly adoption has accelerated.

Similarweb’s analysis did not find direct evidence that paid search or ad spending alone drove the spike, though it flagged the possibility of in-app promotions that their model would not detect. The timing aligns closely with Vibes’ late-September roll-out, implying product-led discovery rather than pure marketing played a major role.

What drives repeat use

Several dynamics explain how a feature like Vibes turns one-off curiosity into repeat sessions:

• Low activation cost: Short videos require little effort to consume and can hook casual users within seconds.

• Creator-friendly loop: Generative tools remove production friction; users who see interesting content can produce their own variations almost instantly.

• Social sharing: Visual clips are easier to share across networks, expanding reach beyond app installs.

• Cross-interest spillover: Attention around other, invite-only tools likely pushed curious users to open, try, and stick with Meta AI’s accessible alternative.

The data suggests the app is converting explorers into daily users. A nearly fourfold increase in DAUs in one month is rare — it typically requires either heavy marketing or a product that meets an unserved need. Vibes appears to have done the latter.

Creators and casual users testing AI video

A simple example illustrates the pattern. A casual creator, curious after seeing headlines about new AI video tools, opens Meta AI and scrolls Vibes. Within minutes they find a short clip format that fits their style, hit “create”, tweak the prompt, and publish. Six hours later the same clip generates comments and re-shares; the creator returns the next day to iterate. That loop — discover, create, amplify — is the same growth engine that short-form platforms have long relied on. Vibes compresses it by pairing AI generation with in-app browsing, lowering the bar for experimentation.

The broader AI video moment helped, too. Industry interest around tools like OpenAI’s Sora created a halo effect: when high-profile, invite-only products generate public curiosity, accessible alternatives can capture spillover demand. According to the details you provided, this dynamic likely nudged users toward Meta AI when they couldn’t access gated competitors.

Meanwhile, Similarweb’s snapshot showed other AI platforms recorded small declines in the same period: ChatGPT (-3.5%), Grok (-7.3%), and Perplexity (-2.3%), suggesting user attention rebalanced toward video-first experiences during this window.

With scale come choices. Meta can convert the Vibes audience into a stable community by introducing creator tools, monetisation primitives, and moderation frameworks. Short-form AI video is naturally monetisable through creator incentives, branded content, or in-app promotion levers that become viable once daily active user baselines stabilise.

But risks are real. Content quality, misinformation, and moderation at scale remain thorny issues for generative video. Rapid growth without robust guardrails can invite regulatory scrutiny and user trust erosion. How Meta balances openness with safeguards will influence whether initial curiosity becomes durable engagement.

Vibes demonstrates that product innovation, especially features that lower creation friction and prioritise discovery, can rapidly reshape engagement in the AI app landscape. Meta’s advantage is distribution and immediacy: when curiosity spikes, an accessible in-app alternative can convert interest into daily use. The next phase will test whether Meta can translate that momentum into lasting habits, responsible moderation, and viable creator economics.