Messenger App Platform
Messaging Apps
Messaging apps (a.k.a. "social messaging" or "chat applications") are apps and platforms that enable instant messaging. Many such apps have developed into broad platforms enabling status updates, chatbots, payments and conversational commerce (e-commerce via chat). They are normally centralised networks run by the servers of the platform's operators, unlike peer-to-peer protocols like XMPP.
Some examples of popular messaging apps include WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, China's WeChat and QQ Messenger, Telegram, Viber, Line, and Snapchat. Certain apps have emphasis on certain uses - for example Skype focuses on video calling, Slack focuses on messaging and file sharing for work teams, and Snapchat focuses on image messages. Some social networking services offer messaging services as a component of their overall platform, such as Facebook's Facebook Messenger, while others have a direct messaging function as an additional adjunct component of their social networking platforms, like Instagram, Reddit, Tumblr and Twitter, either directly or through chat rooms.
Messaging apps are the most widely used smartphone apps, with in 2018 over 1.3 billion monthly users of WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, 980 million monthly active users of WeChat and 843 million monthly active users of QQ Mobile.