Truth Social had 2.4 million monthly users during the same period, despite launching just in February and only on Apple devices, according to Data.ai. The market research firm said another right-leaning platform, Gettr, which launched in July 2021, is ahead of both Parler and Truth Social with about 3.8 million monthly active users.

None of them come close to Twitter, which reported that it had a daily average of about 237.8 million active users during its most recent quarter. Many of the right-wing platforms emerged from opposition to the content-moderation restrictions at mainstream services such as Twitter and Facebook, though billionaire Elon Musk has pledged to lessen some of Twitter’s speech restrictions if he follows through with a promised $US44 billion ($70 billion) takeover of the San Francisco company later this month.

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Parler, which launched in August 2018, didn’t start picking up steam until 2020. But it was kicked offline following the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. A month after the attack, Parler announced a relaunch. It returned to Google Play last month.

“This deal will change the world, and change the way the world thinks about free speech,” Parlement Technologies CEO George Farmer said in a prepared statement.