Meta's new personal AI assistant hit No. 1 on the App Store in under two weeks, racking up roughly 900,000 downloads in its first six days
Meta just shipped the AI product it’s been telegraphing for years, and the early numbers suggest people are actually interested. Muse, the company’s new personal AI agent, climbed to the top of the US Apple App Store free apps chart by September 18, roughly ten days after its September 8 launch.
That means it leapfrogged OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which had been comfortably parked near the top of the AI app rankings for months. Muse accumulated approximately 902,000 downloads in its first six days, a pace that outstripped Meta’s previous standalone AI app, though it still fell short of the viral frenzy that accompanied Threads’ debut in 2023.
Not another chatbot #
What makes Muse different from the crowded field of AI assistants is its positioning as an agent rather than a conversationalist. Instead of just answering questions, Muse is designed to execute multi-step tasks: booking travel, managing calendars, coordinating across digital services.
The app integrates with Gmail, Spotify, and Facebook, among other platforms. For actions that involve sensitive operations, like purchases or account changes, Muse keeps a human in the loop with approval prompts. Meta says the app runs on secure virtual machines, an architecture choice aimed at keeping user data compartmentalized during task execution.
The app launched exclusively in the US for users aged 18 and older. It offers a free tier with usage restrictions, a $20 per month “Power” plan, and a $100 per month “Maximum” tier for heavier users.
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The download numbers in context #
Nearly 900,000 downloads in six days is a strong opening, but context matters. Threads famously hit 100 million sign-ups in five days when it launched, leveraging Instagram’s existing user base for distribution.
Meta’s stock reflected a measured response from Wall Street, gaining approximately 0.6% during the launch window.
Launching into a headwind #
Muse’s debut didn’t happen in a vacuum. Meta recently reached an $18 billion settlement related to social media harms involving minors, a resolution that brought renewed public attention to the company’s track record on user safety.
The WhatsApp integration is particularly interesting as a distribution play. WhatsApp has over two billion users globally, and making Muse accessible through the messaging platform could give Meta a pathway to international expansion that standalone app downloads alone can’t match. For now, though, the US-only restriction keeps that potential bottled up.
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