(Reuters) – Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:) will begin running ads on its social media platform threads with several brands in the U.S. and Japan, it said on Friday, as the app reaches more than 300 million monthly active users.
During early testing starting Friday, image ads will appear in the Threads Home Feed, placed between content posts for a small percentage of users, Meta said in a blog post.
The social media giant said it will monitor the test closely before scaling it widely, adding that companies will be able to expand their existing meta ad campaigns on topics.
Meta will also begin testing an AI-enabled inventory filter for in-thread ads, allowing advertisers to control the level of sensitivity of the organic content their ads appear next to.
“Launching Threads ads just weeks after Meta’s content makeover will raise advertisers’ eyebrows. But Tiktok’s volatility is prompting brands to look for alternatives, and Meta won’t pass on the opportunity to throw a thread into the mix,” said Jasmine Enberg, chief analyst at eMarketer.
Meta earlier this month ended its US fact-checking program on Facebook, Instagram and Themes, three of the world’s largest social media platforms with more than 3 billion users worldwide.
Threams launched in July 2023 as a challenger to X, formerly Twitter, in an effort to win over users from the de facto micro-blogging site during its chaotic takeover by billionaire Elon Musk.
Meta doesn’t expect themes to be a “meaningful revenue driver from 2025,” CFO Susan Li said in October on a post-earnings call.
The company plans to spend as much as $65 billion this year to expand its AI infrastructure, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said earlier Friday, aiming to strengthen the company’s position against rivals Openai and Google ( NASDAQ 🙂 in the race to dominate the technology.
