Threads is finally available to users in the EU | TechCrunch

Five months after its launch in July, Meta’s social network Threads is now finally available to people living in the European Union.

At launch, the company restricted access to the new social network in the EU to become compliant with various rules of the bloc. Users weren’t able to download the app to access the social network. And, at that time, Threads didn’t even have a web version to access posts through URLs.

In July, days after Threads’ launch, Meta had to take “additional” steps to prevent EU-based users from using a VPN to access the social network.

The official launch comes after the Wall Street Journal’s report last month indicated that Meta planned to launch Threads in the EU in December. Last week, Threads placed a countdown timer on its home page pointing towards a December 14 launch in the region.

During Meta’s Q3 earnings call, Mark Zuckerberg said that Threads has less than 100 million monthly active users. The social network’s launch in the EU will help the company cross that mark.

On Wednesday, Zuckerberg announced that Threads had started experimenting with ActivityPub integration. This way, the posts originally published on the Meta-owned social network could appear on compatible decentralized networks such as Mastodon.