Path
The social network with a 50-friend limit, big in Indonesia, closed by Kakao
Path was a private mobile social network launched on 14 November 2010 by former Facebook executive Dave Morin with Napster's Shawn Fanning, limited at first to 50 close friends. Praised for its design and famous for turning down Google, it hit 10 million users in 2013, mostly in Indonesia, and was caught uploading users' address books in 2012. Kakao bought it in 2015 and shut it down on 18 October 2018.
Timeline [edit]
- 2010
-
14 November 2010
Launch
Path launches
A photo network for your closest 50 people.
- 2011
-
2 February 2011
other
Path turns down Google
A reported $100 million-plus offer, declined.
-
29 November 2011
Version
Path 2.0
The redesign that made Path a template for app design.
- 2012
-
8 February 2012
Incident
The address book scandal
Path is caught uploading users' iPhone contacts; Apple changes iOS.
- 2013
-
1 February 2013
Legal
FTC settlement
$800,000 over children's data and the contacts collection.
-
24 April 2013
Peak
10 million users
Growth is fastest in Indonesia, where Path becomes mainstream.
- 2015
-
28 May 2015
Acquisition
Kakao buys Path
The Korean messaging company wants Path's Indonesian users.
- 2018
-
17 September 2018
Shutdown announced
Path announces its closure
Users get a month to export their data.
-
18 October 2018
Shutdown
Path shuts down
The service stops working eight years after launch.
How it looked [edit]
The site through time
Browse path.com as it was, via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine:
Ownership [edit]
Key figures [edit]
| Metric | Value | As of | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Registered accounts ▲ | 10 million | 24 April 2013 | Reported Announced by Path in April 2013 |
Confirmed official figures · Reported media, cites a source · Estimated analyst or our estimate
Why it shut down [edit]
Official line: Path's owner since 2015, the Korean messaging company Kakao, announced on 17 September 2018 that the service would close, and on 18 October 2018 users could no longer log in. Growth had stalled after 2013 everywhere except Indonesia, and Kakao, which had bought Path largely for that market, decided it no longer justified the cost.
Our analysis: Path had one great idea, an intimate network capped at the people you actually know, and a beautiful app to hold it, and it turned out that a private network with no growth loop cannot compete with the public ones for attention. Every step to fix that, from raising the friend limit to removing it, made Path more like Facebook, which already existed. The address book scandal did not kill it, but it spent the goodwill Path had earned by promising to be the trustworthy one.
History [edit]
Fifty friends
Path launched on 14 November 2010 as an iPhone app for sharing photos with, at most, 50 people. The number came from Dunbar's research on how many close relationships a person can hold, and the pitch from Dave Morin, who had run Facebook Platform, was that the big networks had become performances for acquaintances. Path was for the inner circle: no public profiles, no followers, no reshares. Shawn Fanning, of Napster, and designer Dustin Mierau were the co-founders, and the app was, by consensus, one of the most beautiful on the phone.
In February 2011 Morin turned down a reported $100 million-plus offer from Google, and the redesigned Path 2.0 that November, with its timeline of "moments", its clock that scrolled with you and its fan-out plus button, became the template for a generation of app design and raised the friend cap to 150.
The address book
In February 2012 a developer in Singapore noticed that Path was uploading users' entire iPhone address books to its servers without asking. Morin apologised and deleted the data, Apple changed iOS to require permission for contacts, and in February 2013 Path settled with the US Federal Trade Commission, paying $800,000 over the collection of children's data. Path had sold itself as the network you could trust; the episode is what many people remember about it.
Ten million, mostly in Jakarta
Path reached 10 million users in April 2013 and, unexpectedly, found its biggest audience in Indonesia, where it became a mainstream social app rather than a niche one, reaching around four million users there. Elsewhere growth stalled. Path removed the friend limit in 2014, split messaging into a separate app, Path Talk, and raised a $25 million Series C, bringing total funding to about $66 million.
On 28 May 2015 Kakao, the Korean company behind KakaoTalk, bought Path and Path Talk for an undisclosed sum, explicitly to strengthen its position in Indonesia. Kakao kept the apps running for three years without much visible investment.
Closing
On 17 September 2018 Path announced it would close, thanking users for eight years and offering a data export. It left the app stores on 1 October and stopped working on 18 October 2018. Morin has since said he would like to bring it back; the "close friends" idea itself was absorbed into Instagram, which added a Close Friends list a few weeks after Path died.
The domain today
path.com no longer resolves; there are no DNS records for it.
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Sources [edit]
- Path launches a personal network limited to 50 friends TechCrunch 14 November 2010 [archived]
- Google tried to buy Path for $100 million. Path said no. TechCrunch 2 February 2011 [archived]
- Path uploads your entire iPhone address book to its servers Wired 8 February 2012 [archived]
- Path settles FTC charges that it deceived consumers and improperly collected personal information Federal Trade Commission 1 February 2013 [archived]
- Kakao buys Path Business Insider 28 May 2015 [archived]
- Mobile social network Path, once a challenger to Facebook, is closing down TechCrunch 17 September 2018 [archived]
Last verified: 15 August 2026. Spotted an error? Suggest an edit (corrections with sources are reviewed and applied).