Meta's Muse Is Outpacing ChatGPT's Early Mobile Launch

Meta's new personal AI agent has pulled in more downloads and daily active users in its first two weeks than ChatGPT did over the same stretch after its 2023 mobile debut, but analysts warn the head start comes with an asterisk.

Meta's newest artificial intelligence app, Muse, is off to one of the fastest starts the consumer AI market has seen and the comparison everyone is drawing is with the app that started the whole boom. According to fresh estimates from multiple market-intelligence firms, Muse has been downloaded more times, and is being used by more people each day, than OpenAI's ChatGPT was at the equivalent point after its own mobile launch.

The data suggests Muse could become Meta's next breakout product. But because the two apps launched under very different conditions different countries, different app stores, and a three-year gap in which consumer AI became mainstream the numbers deserve a closer read before anyone declares a winner.

The Numbers: How Muse's Launch Compares to ChatGPT

App intelligence firm Appfigures estimates that Muse was downloaded roughly 1.8 million times on iOS across the U.S. and Canada in its first 12 days, ahead of the 1.3 million downloads ChatGPT logged over the same 12-day window after its mobile debut. Across both the Apple App Store and Google Play, Muse has racked up about 2.8 million installs in that period.

The gap is even wider on engagement. Muse recorded around 642,000 U.S. mobile daily active users, compared with roughly 231,000 for ChatGPT at the same stage. To keep the comparison fair, Muse launched on both iOS and Android, while ChatGPT was iOS-only at its mobile debut — analysts also isolated iOS-only figures. Even there, Muse came out ahead, with about 359,000 daily active users on iOS.

Launch-window comparison at a glance

Muse Overtakes ChatGPT, Claude and Grok at the Top of the App Store

A separate estimate from Sensor Tower, reported by CNBC, tells a similar story. Muse pulled in about 730,000 U.S. downloads in its first five days and climbed to the No. 1 free iPhone app in the United States by September 18, overtaking ChatGPT, Anthropic's Claude, xAI's Grok and even Meta's own Meta AI app. By the following Monday, cumulative downloads had passed 2.5 million — roughly 1.5 million on iOS and 1.1 million on Android.

There is an important nuance here. Over the same 13-day post-launch window, Muse's cumulative total outpaced Claude (about 400,000) and Grok (about 200,000), but ChatGPT itself pulled in around 3.1 million downloads during that stretch. In other words, Muse is beating ChatGPT's 2023 launch pace, not ChatGPT's current, far larger audience. Sensor Tower also cautioned that the rival apps had staggered releases across the two app stores, which muddies any direct head-to-head.

Cumulative downloads over the same 13-day launch window

What Is Meta Muse?

Meta launched Muse on September 8, 2026, describing it as "the world's first personal AI agent built for everyone." Unlike a chatbot that only answers questions, Muse is designed to carry out multi-step tasks on a user's behalf. Meta says that once a person shares a goal, Muse builds a plan, coordinates time and resources, and then advances the work on its own, opening a browser, filling out forms, and even negotiating for the user.

The app is powered by Muse Spark, Meta's most capable model family to date, and is positioned as a cornerstone of CEO Mark Zuckerberg's vision of "personal superintelligence" available to everyone. It also remembers details a user mentions once, so it can make proactive suggestions later.

What Muse can do

1. Book travel, appointments and reservations, and fill out online forms.
2. Draft and send emails, and organize and triage the inbox.
3. Manage calendars and coordinate schedules across connected apps.
4. Shop, compare deals and make payments (with confirmation before sensitive actions).
5. Turn a saved Instagram recipe reel into a grocery list or a dinner-party menu.
6. Monitor home security cameras and other connected smart-home services.

How it runs and how Meta says it stays private

Muse does not run locally on the phone. Each user's agent operates inside its own dedicated cloud virtual machine that Meta calls the Muse Secure VM, complete with a visible browser window so the user can watch the agent work. A separate "Sentinel" agent runs on the same machine to approve, block or escalate every connected-app action. Meta AI chief Alexandr Wang says the agent runs in an isolated environment and "never sees your actual passwords or payment details," and it asks for sign-off before spending money or sending a message.

Muse at a glance

Muse Pricing: Free, Power and Maximum Tiers

Muse launches with a free tier and two paid subscriptions. Unusually, the plans are priced on usage volume rather than features, the paid tiers unlock more capacity within the same agent, not different capabilities. Meta says it expects most people to stay on the free plan.

Meta's Distribution Advantage: The Threads Playbook

Much of Muse's early momentum likely comes from Meta's unmatched distribution. The company can introduce the app to billions of existing Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp users rather than building an audience from scratch, the same cross-promotion strategy that helped Threads surpass 500 million users.

The overlap is striking: Appfigures estimates that more than 95% of Muse users also use Facebook, and 63% also use Instagram. That is consistent with an early audience drawn straight from Meta's own ecosystem though it does not reveal why those users downloaded Muse, or whether they will keep coming back.

What to Watch Next

The next meaningful signal is retention, not installs. If Muse's daily active users hold up over the coming weeks, and if Meta can extend the app beyond the U.S. and past its early adopters, the Threads comparison will start to look apt. If engagement fades once the novelty and cross-promotion wear off, the fast start will read as a distribution win rather than a product one. For now, Muse has done something few apps manage: it has made OpenAI's launch records the benchmark to beat.