How Bluesky, the Rival of Elon Musk’s X, Is Seizing the Moment

Donald Trump’s US election victory — and Elon Musk’s role in helping to get him elected — has sent some users of Musk’s social networking service X searching for alternatives. Musk has spent months pushing Trump’s agenda to his more than 200 million followers on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, and has been taking a virtual victory lap since Trump’s win. X’s move toward the political right has turned some users away, and one of the key beneficiaries has been Bluesky, a relatively new social network that looks and feels a lot like X.

Bluesky is a social media service with a lot of the same features you might find on X, Facebook and Instagram. Users can create a profile, follow other accounts, like and re-share posts, and send private messages. Bluesky users have the option to see several different feeds based on their interests. They can see traditional feeds made up of posts from the people they choose to follow, for example, or scroll through feeds focused on certain topics, such as science, gardening or “cat pics.”