Google+

The social network everyone was signed up to and nobody used

Shut down
19902026

Google+ was Google's all-out attempt to fight Facebook, launched on 28 June 2011 and force-integrated into YouTube, Gmail and search. Despite hundreds of millions of created accounts, 90% of sessions lasted under five seconds. Google announced its closure after an API data exposure and shut it down on 2 April 2019.

Timeline

  1. 2011
  2. 28 June 2011 Launch
    Google+ launches, invite-only

    Circles, Hangouts and Sparks debut.

  3. 20 September 2011 Feature
    Opens to the public

    After 89 days invite-only, anyone can join.

  4. 2012
  5. 19 January 2012 Peak
    Larry Page claims 90 million users

    Sign-ups driven by mandatory Google account integration, most of whom never return.

  6. 2013
  7. 6 November 2013 Feature
    YouTube comments require Google+

    The most hated integration of the forced-growth era.

  8. 2014
  9. 24 April 2014 Decline
    Vic Gundotra departs

    The executive who built Google+ leaves; the forced-integration strategy unwinds within a year.

  10. 2015
  11. 27 July 2015 Decline
    Google unwinds forced integration

    G+ accounts no longer required across Google products.

  12. 2018
  13. 8 October 2018 Incident
    Project Strobe: API bug and shutdown announced

    Bug exposed up to 500K accounts; known since March, undisclosed.

  14. 10 December 2018 Incident
    Second API bug hits 52.5 million users

    Shutdown pulled forward from August to April.

  15. 2019
  16. 2 April 2019 Shutdown
    Consumer Google+ shuts down

    All consumer accounts, pages and content deleted.

Ownership

Google 2011–2019 Founded Led by Vic Gundotra until 2014

Why it shut down

Official line: Google announced the consumer shutdown in its Project Strobe review, citing "significant challenges" and "low usage": 90% of user sessions lasted under five seconds. An API bug that exposed up to 500,000 users' data set the timetable.

Our analysis: Google+ failed years before it closed: forced integration created hundreds of millions of accounts but no community. The 2018 API data exposures, and the decision not to disclose the first one, merely fixed the shutdown date and moved it forward once more bugs surfaced.

History

The Facebook killer

Google+ launched in June 2011 with real innovations (Circles for granular sharing, Hangouts for group video) and the full weight of the company behind it. That weight became the problem: sign-ups were forced through Gmail, YouTube commenting required a G+ account from 2013, and employee bonuses were tied to "social". Google could manufacture accounts by the hundreds of millions; it could not manufacture a reason to come back.

Strobe

By 2015 Google had unwound the forced integrations, and G+ drifted as a ghost town with a small, genuinely devoted photography and tech community. In October 2018 the Project Strobe security review disclosed an API bug that had exposed up to 500,000 accounts' profile data (known internally since March, undisclosed, as the Wall Street Journal revealed). Announcing the fix, Google admitted the numbers: 90% of sessions under five seconds, and scheduled the consumer shutdown. A second bug in December (52.5 million users) pulled the date forward to 2 April 2019, when Google deleted the pages, photos and posts of its last, loyal holdouts. The pattern (force-fed growth, quiet abandonment, sudden erasure) is why Google Reader veterans saw it coming.

Similar projects

MySpace A place for friends 2003–now Digg The front page of the web, until v4 2004–2012 Friendster The social network that came first 2002–2015 Orkut Brazil's living room, built in a 20% project 2004–2014 ICQ The messenger that gave you a number 1996–2024 Winamp It really whips the llama's ass 1997–2013

Sources

  1. Project Strobe: Protecting your data, improving our third-party APIs, and sunsetting consumer Google+ Google 8 October 2018 [archived]
  2. Google is shutting down Google+ for consumers following security lapse The Verge 8 October 2018 [archived]

Last verified: 11 August 2026