A week ago Clubhouse, the explosively popular audio social-media platform, announced that a handful of testers were trying out a “rough beta version” of the app on Android. That has expanded into an open beta, so all Android users can get in on the craze.
Clubhouse opens its doors
Clubhouse has been around since March 2020, but only on iOS. In the announcement post for the Android open beta, Clubhouse explains that this is because it wanted to grow slowly and predictably rather than expand too quickly and spin out.
“We’ve always taken a measured approach to growth, keeping the team small, building in public, and getting feedback from the community along the way. When you scale communities too quickly, things can break. So we started Clubhouse on a single platform and have expanded gradually through an invite model.”
The announcement goes on to explain that the sudden, rapid growth of the platform earlier this year put a lot of strain on Clubhouse’s team, servers, and systems. The focus was on building up the team and company to keep up with the community’s growth, rather than on expanding the platform itself. Clubhouse hopes the community appreciate this in the long run.
Now, finally, Clubhouse is open for all Android users, albeit with a few stipulations. The big one being the fact that the beta uses a waitlist and invite system. You can access the app here, but you currently have to sign up to a waitlist and then, obviously, wait to be let in. Or, like with regular Clubhouse on iOS, if you have a friend already participating in the Android beta they can send you an invite that will let you skip the queue.
It’s also worth noting that the beta is also missing a few features from the full release, such as payments, in-app translations, club creation and management features, and others. You can find the full list and some more info on the official FAQ.
The beta is arriving in the US first, and will expand to other English-speaking countries, and then the rest of the world. You can sign up for the beta here but it’ll be a while before you get your turn.
