Twitter pulling the plug on early live-streaming app Periscope

Twitter is shutting down Periscope, the live-streaming app it launched in 2015, the social media company said on Tuesday. Periscope will be removed from app stores in March of 2021 and will stop signing up users as of December 15.

In a blog post explaining its decision, Twitter said the app's path was "unsustainable."

"Over the past couple of years, we've seen declining usage and know that the cost to support the app will only continue to go up over time," the company wrote on Medium. Twitter added that it "probably would have made this decision sooner if it weren't for all of the projects we reprioritized due to the events of 2020."

Most of Periscope's functions will be available via the "go live" feature on Twitter's main app. The Periscope website will be open until March for users to view and download previous broadcasts. Twitter is also relaxing its requirements for "Super Broadcasters," a small group of Periscope users who could receive cash from fans. Users will be able to apply to be "Super Broadcasters" through February of next year.

Periscope, which was started by two Stanford graduates in 2014, was one of the first apps to allow users to stream their activities live and interact with their viewers. Twitter bought the app in 2015 before it even launched publicly. 

That same year, Facebook introduced its live-streaming feature. YouTube, which started letting some users live-stream in 2013, made the feature widely available through its app in 2017.