Meta's Muse AI hits 5 million downloads as company open-sources hardware toolkit amid privacy worries

Meta (META)'s Muse AI agent passed 5 million downloads less than a month after launch, according to mobile data firm Sensor Tower, reaching the milestone in about three weeks. That is faster than OpenAI's ChatGPT, which took 56 days, and well ahead of Anthropic's Claude and xAI's Grok. Mashable reported the app was ranked #1 on both Apple's App Store and Google Play, though Sensor Tower noted the pace is a record only for AI apps: Threads, Disney+ and several games got there as fast. 9to5Mac, citing the same firm, put the figure at 22 days and noted Meta ramped up advertising for Muse from September 16, with the app available only in the US and Canada.

On October 2, Meta opened a developer front for the agent. Muse Gadgets is an open-source project that provides ESP32 firmware and a Linux SDK so builders can connect Muse to displays, buttons, sensors and other devices. Meta's own first gadget is the Muse Home Link, a small USB-C dongle that lets Muse talk to smart home devices; Nat Friedman, head of product at Meta's superintelligence labs, said Meta made a batch of 5,000 that are free to Muse subscribers while supplies last. It follows the Muse Charm device Mark Zuckerberg showed at Connect. Commerce is a parallel push, with coverage highlighting that Muse can shop and complete checkout on a user's behalf.

The adoption has come with privacy scrutiny over Muse's access to private messages. Mashable flagged a viral post saying Muse sold an item on Facebook Marketplace without telling its owner. Separately, an Inc. columnist said Muse read his Messages history despite declined permission, a claim Meta disputes, saying Messages access is opt-in. Things to watch: whether downloads hold up as ad spending normalizes, how many developers adopt Muse Gadgets, and how Meta responds to Apple's planned tightening of Mac Full Disk Access, which Muse can use to read local messages.