You may have heard about social media giants like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok. These platforms have the largest share of social media users, which means they are already saturated. Therefore, you need to find new and upcoming players to stay ahead of the competition on social media. In this article, we will reveal some of the new players who are already gaining traction and taking the battle among social media sites to a new level.

Why You Should Take Advantage of New Social Media Platforms

If you are an early adopter of a social media platform, you can gain a lot of benefits, such as:

• Being amongst the first users to build networks before others can join.
• Have your content rank organically because of less competition. You can even position yourself as an expert or insider because you will learn the ropes early, including the social media platform algorithm.
• Better proficiency on the platform. It’s not only about joining a social media platform; it’s also about showing your proficiency. You discover new opportunities and position yourself as an authority on the platform.

Top 5 Upcoming Social Media Platforms Gaining Traction

Now that we have seen the benefits of being an early adopter of a social media platform, let us look at some of the new plays that are gaining traction. These are:

Discord

Created in 2015 to serve the needs of gamers, Discord is one of the platforms that is quickly gaining traction. Already, it has reached 140 million active users worldwide and is now widely used as a platform for collaboration and social interaction. Users on the platforms can create servers to make video and voice calls, create chat channels, and send text messages. They can even integrate bots.

Gamers use Discord to communicate when playing. However, today, the platform is also popular for users outside the gaming sector, including creative projects in fashion, education, and other fields.

Mastodon

Developed in Germany in 2016, Mastodon is a fast-rising decentralized social media platform focused on data protection. As an open-source app, users on the platform can host servers to establish and even build communities. Some of the top features of the platform include:

• Sharing of images and texts.
• Individual control of the user’s privacy settings.

These features set the platform apart from others, as it is similar to other social media platforms. Users on the platforms can create posts with a maximum of 50000 characters. This is on top of adding audios, images, and videos.

With over 10 million active users, Mastodon is undoubtedly one of the fastest-growing social media platforms. This is especially true because it started exploding in popularity in 2022. In 2023 alone, it grew from 300,000 users to over 1.7 million users.

Threads

Developed by Meta in 20123 as an alternative to Twitter, Thread allows users to create short messages and communicate with their friends. It is, therefore, a text-based network focusing on sending and receiving messages. It targets Instagram users searching for quick ways of communicating with their friends. 

Threads caused ripples when it registered 100 million users within a few months. While it did not keep up with this growth rate, the platform can continue to develop new features to generate user interest. According to Meta CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, Threads has the potential to reach 1 billion users in the next few years. Therefore, creating a social media marketing plan with Threads can be crucial.

Be Real

As an app created to promote honest and authentic communication, Be Real encourages users to share their honest feelings, thoughts, and moments without the pressure of that perfect moment. The platform allows users to upload texts, images, and videos that show their authentic personality without filters or fake personas.

The app’s primary focus is for users to look for authenticity during social interactions. While platforms such as Instagram and TikTok allow users to share their unfiltered content, Be Real stands out because of its focus on genuineness and authenticity.

BlueSky

BlueSky is a decentralized social media platform built on the open-source protocol. It is invite-only and had over 25 million users as of December 2024. It is considered an alternative to Twitter as former X CEO Jack Dorsey created it while still in the role. With an Android and iOS app, it resembles Dorsey’s former products.

TelloNym

Tellonym is a social media platform founded in Germany. It focuses on open communication through anonymous feedback, which means its user base is predominantly German. However, you can use the platform to get honest feedback from the people who care about you.

As a cross-messaging app, TelloNym allows users to send and receive anonymous feedback. Users can send messages, give feedback, and ask one another questions. Launched in 2016, the app has over 10 million downloads in the Play Store. 

How to Take Advantage of New Social Media Platform

To benefit from being an early adopter of new social media platforms, you can take the following steps:

• Create a profile. Creating an account is the best way to determine how a new social media platform will turn out. While many fizzle out, if the platform takes off, you will be on the ground to know what is happening.
• Stay active. Once you see your friends joining, it will be a sign that the platform is ready for takeoff. Be strategic when devoting time to new platforms, and only be active when you start to see signs of takeoff. It could be a sign that it will work when you see that people are signing up, coming back, and posting on it.
• Cross-promote. Unless it’s your first time on social media, you have probably already built a following on a significant platform. You can grow your profile faster by cross-promoting on other social media platforms where you have a large following.

Final Thoughts

You are likely already late if you are trying to build a following on TikTok, Facebook, or Twitter. However, the best opportunities lie in the new and hardly discovered social media platforms. When you join and become an early adopter of such a platform, you can have an immense advantage if it takes off. If you are searching for a new social media platform with great potential, consider one of the above options.