Facebook Messenger Has 200 Million Users

The other day Facebook made a pretty controversial decision when they announced that they’d be removing the Chat feature from their Facebook mobile app. Instead if users wanted to chat with their friends, they’d need to download the separate Facebook Messenger app. For those who use Messenger, this is not a big deal, but for those who don’t, this change is pretty much forced upon them.

Perhaps trying to justify the change, Mark Zuckerberg announced during the company’s quarterly earnings conference call that more than 200 million people are using Facebook Messenger. This is actually the first time that the app’s usage numbers have been released and this has since been confirmed by a Facebook’s spokesman to the folks at Re/code.

On one hand it is pretty convenient to have a separate app since it means that users won’t have to open Facebook if they want to chat, but at the same time for those who don’t chat often on Facebook, the need to download another app might seem like a waste of time. However with Facebook removing in-app chatting, which does not affect low-end devices, Windows Phone, or tablet users, perhaps that 200 million figure could see an increase.

In any case it seems that Facebook is pretty big on messaging because once their deal with WhatsApp closes, it seems that they will be able to add another 500 million users to their list. What do you guys think? Will we start seeing more Facebook Messenger users in the future?

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Apps, Facebook, messenger