What is Threads? All your questions about Meta's new Twitter rival, answered

Threads, a text-based app built by Meta to rival Twitter, is live.

The app, billed as the text version of Meta's photo-sharing platform Instagram, became available Wednesday night to users in more than 100 countries — including the U.S., Britain, Australia, Canada and Japan. Despite some early glitches, 30 million people had signed up before noon on Thursday, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Threads.

New arrivals to the platform include celebrities like Oprah, pop star Shakira and chef Gordon Ramsay — as well as corporate accounts from Taco Bell, Netflix, Spotify, the Washington Post and other media outlets.

Threads, which Meta says provides "a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations," arrives at a time when many are looking for Twitter alternatives to escape Elon Musk's raucous oversight of the platform since acquiring it last year for $44 billion. But Meta's new app has also raised data privacy concerns, and is notably unavailable in the European Union.

Here's what you need to know about Threads.