Six months after launching a major redesign that 1.2 million users hated, Snapchat (NYSE: SNAP) gave in and revamped the popular social media app. It started last November with the release of a more personal Snapchat that separated personal content from friends from the content provided by publishers, creators and influencers. That redesign was a big bust. In fact, more than 1.2 million users signed a petition on Change.org to protest the redesign.

Earlier this year, Snap CEO Evan Spiegel wasn’t bothered by the criticism. In fact, he told attendees at a Goldman Sachs Internet & Technology Conference that people will eventually adjust. He must have changed his mind. According to Tech Times, the new Snapchat returns Chats and Snaps to chronological order, and Stories have been returned to the right-hand side of the app. The redesign will be available to iOS users first. It is not clear when Android users would get the revamped app.

In a Recode article about the revamp, a company spokesperson said, ‘We are always listening to our community and will continue to test updates that we hope will give Snapchatters the best possible experience on our platform.’

Did Snap bow to pressure from users, or did declining usage and a decrease in revenue play a part in the latest redesign? Spiegel said user behavior is stabilizing but performance had declined in the redesign, reports TechCrunch.

The rollout comes a few weeks after Snap released its first quarter financials which showed mixed results. Here are highlights from that report:

• Revenue was $230.7 million in Q1 2018, a 54 percent increase year-over-year. Snap says the increase was driven by growth in Snap Ads, but down 19 percent sequentially due to seasonality and the redesign.
• Daily Active Users grew from 166 million to 191 million, a 15 percent increase year-over-year.
• Average revenue per user was $1.21, a 34 percent increase year-over-year.
• Cost of revenue per user was $1.03, a 5 percent increase year-over-year.
• Snap reported a net loss of $385.8 million for the first quarter, an 83 percent improvement over a $2.2 billion loss in Q1 2017.

Spiegel addressed the redesign during the earnings call.

‘As we have mentioned on our past two earnings calls, a change this big to existing behavior comes with some disruption, especially given the high frequency of daily engagement of our community,’ Spiegel said. ‘We are already starting to see early signs of stabilization among our iOS users as people get used to the changes, but still have a lot of work to do to optimize the new design, especially for our Android users. Our time spent remained more than 30 minutes per day on average following the redesign, and we have also started to realize some of the positive benefits, including increased user retention for older users.’

Will Snapchat be able to rebound? Motley Fool isn’t convinced. According to the YouGov BrandIndex, users aged 18 to 34 rated the Snapchat brand as an 8 on a scale of 1 to 100. It had previously ranked 30. In a satisfaction score, Snapchat went from a 27 in late January to a 12 in mid-April. Kylie Jenner’s February tweet certainly didn’t help, lowering Snapchat’s stock value by $1.3 billion with a single tweet.

Investors certainly aren’t impressed. Snap stock is close to its lowest point in a year. As of 7:59 p.m. EDT yesterday, Snap stock was $10.74 per share. A year ago, on May 23, 2017, Snap stock was nearly double at $20.03 per share. Its low in the last year was $10.57 per share on May 17, 2018.

Insider Take:

Full disclosure: I’m not a Snapchat user. I’ve downloaded it and used it in the past, but it didn’t really fit my lifestyle and wasn’t really me. However, I can see why so many people like it. It is a fun way to connect with friends. What I find disconcerting about Snap is that the CEO was so cavalier about the major redesign, essentially telling users to get used to it. Yet now the company is rolling back many of the changes. At the same time, the company’s stock value has dropped nearly in half and the company continues to post huge losses. If Snap doesn’t turn things around quickly, it may not be able to recover from the failed redesign.