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The mobile messenger for chatting by Facebook now has more than 500 million users to its name. The company also claims that Facebook Messenger is one of the most widely used mobile messaging apps in the world. The messenger now logs in more than 500 million users monthly.
“This is an exciting milestone,” said Peter Martinazzi, Facebook’s director of product management, announcing the stat. Facebook’s main app has around 1.35 billion users; Facebook-owned WhatsApp has at least 600 million users. WeChat, owned by China’s Tencent, has at around 438 million users, as of this past August.
Facebook reached its milestone but it also angered most of its users along the way. The company began requiring people to download Messenger for mobile chat several months ago, drawing criticism from those who didn’t want to download a separate app for messages. Before that, Messenger had roughly 200 million monthly users, the company previously reported in April.
Some people still seem annoyed, or confused, about why Facebook made the change. Clearly on why Facebook forced users to download the app was one of the most popular online questions submitted in the lead up to Facebook’s first public town hall meeting last week.
Facebook thought it could provide a better, faster messaging product by separating it, was CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s explanation.
Rebecca McGhee
Rebecca McGhee is a valuable contributor for several publications and online platforms. Having graduates with a degree in Computer Science, her interest lies mostly in this area. Yet, she finds any tech-related topic or scientific topic is a challenge worth meeting. She enjoys turning her own research projects in worthy contributions that reach the large public. And mostly, she is grateful for all the feedback she receives from readers, as she believes it aids her in permanently improving her style of writing, beyond the scientific style she is accustomed to.
