The “should we be on Bluesky?” question now has a clearer answer: the platform is large enough to justify testing, but it will not behave like your paid social channels. Bluesky grew nearly 60% in 2025, ending with 41.41 million registered users, and passed 46.8 million by October 2026.
That growth has not come with an ads engine. For marketers, that changes the job: you cannot buy visibility, so the work shifts to being useful, showing up consistently and getting into the right feeds.
Why Bluesky plays by different rules
On most platforms, an algorithm decides what gets seen. Bluesky hands that control to users. There is no single algorithm to crack, because people choose and pin their own custom feeds around topics they care about.
The main Following feed is chronological. That means new posts rise to the top quickly, but they also get buried quickly. As Ben Metcalfe, Founder of BlackFire Marketing, told Hootsuite, reach “comes down to when you post, how often, and whether users have chosen to follow you.”
Where the opportunity sits
Bluesky’s audience skews American, male and under 35, but the more interesting signal is the concentration of journalists, researchers, founders and industry insiders. That makes it a strong fit for brands that want to build authority rather than just drive clicks.
Metcalfe frames the right mindset: “I would encourage brands to think of Bluesky as a community-building channel rather than a paid acquisition channel.” Competition is also lower than on LinkedIn or X, so there is still room to become a familiar name before your category crowds in.
An 80/20 mix for a feed with no ads
Attention on Bluesky has to be earned. A practical content mix is about 80% value-first posts and 20% promotion. Useful posts could include:
- A sharp point of view on a trending industry topic
- Original data or research your team can share
- A short explainer thread on something your audience finds confusing
- Links to genuinely helpful resources, whether yours or someone else’s
GitHub offers a useful model. Its Bluesky presence leads with developer tips, including a person from the company on camera, which makes the content feel more human than a branded announcement.
A step-by-step path to momentum
Start with a specific goal—building authority or reaching journalists, for example—then set up your account with a custom domain handle so impersonation is harder. Plan a few content pillars, but leave room to react to live conversations.
Bring internal experts into the mix. Founders, product leads and researchers often carry a stronger point of view than a corporate account. Then search the Feeds tab for active communities in your space and join the conversation rather than lurking.
Write for custom feeds when it fits naturally. Some feeds include posts with certain hashtags or keywords; adding the right one can put your post in front of people who do not follow you yet.
Mistakes that make Bluesky feel like a dead end
The most common errors come from applying the usual social playbook. Ignoring custom feeds means only talking to people who already follow you. Posting once and disappearing is costly in a chronological feed. And expecting Instagram or TikTok-sized reach can hide the real win: reaching the right journalists, customers and insiders.
What to do this week
Claim a custom domain handle, choose three active feeds related to your category, and run a 30-day test with an 80/20 value-first cadence. A scheduling tool can help you stay consistent, but the core habit is simply showing up with something useful more often than you sell.
