Since the COVID-19 pandemic hit just over a year ago, have you been one of the many FOMO sufferers who have been desperately seeking out someone who could invite you on to lLive audio app Clubhouse – or been willing to pay for it even?

Well, if you’re not on the app yet, now’s your chance since Clubhouse has announced it’s removed its invite system so that anyone can join the platform.

The social app, which saw explosive early growth during the COVID-19 pandemic, previously required people to be invited by an existing user or request to join a waitlist. It said in a blog post on Wednesday (July 21) that it had always planned to open up the app but that invites had been a way of tempering user numbers.

But might have also been spurred on by the fact that Clubhouse faces new competition from social media companies, including Facebook, Twitter, as well as streaming company Spotify, which have launched similar audio chat services.

“We know there will be many more ups and downs as we scale, and competition from the large networks will be fierce,” the company wrote in its post.

Clubhouse said it had added 10 million people since launching on Android in May. Estimates from analytics firm Sensor Tower found the app had reached about 7.8 million global installs in June, up from 3.7 million the previous month.

The company, which said its team had expanded since January from eight to 58 people, launched a direct messaging feature last week.