X
Business

​WhatsApp: Now one billion people send 55 billion messages per day

Nearly everyone who uses WhatsApp each month also uses it every day -- and they're sending loads of messages.
Written by Liam Tung, Contributing Writer
42908400348478.jpg
WhatsApp

The eight-year old messaging app WhatsApp is now used by one billion people every day.

WhatsApp reached the one billion active monthly user milestone a year ago, and now has 1.3 billion monthly active users, most of whom use it daily, according to the company.

WhatsApp shared the daily active user numbers in a blogpost along with other metrics showing how people use the app, following the release of Facebook's Q2 2017 earnings yesterday.

WhatsApp said 55 billion messages are sent each day on platform, and users also share 4.5 billion photos and one billion videos per day.

"Whether it's sharing personalized photos and videos, connecting through video calling, or keeping friends updated throughout the day with Status, communicating on WhatsApp has never been easier or more personal," WhatsApp said in the blog.

At F8 last April, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said messages sent on Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp combined totaled 60 billion per day.

After announcing Messenger had 1.2 billion monthly users this April, Facebook's head of Messenger, David Marcus told TechCrunch it had seen "double-digit growth percentage-wise" in terms of messages sent per user on Messenger.

Facebook last month said it had reached two billion monthly users, and yesterday noted that as of June it had 1.32 billion daily users.

Asked yesterday by an analyst about WhatsApp's revenue prospects compared to Messenger, Facebook's CFO, David Wehner, said the company isn't sharing detailed engagement figures by messaging platform, but noted differences in usage for each by region.

"WhatsApp has demonstrated significant engagement with crossing a billion daily actives. So I think that indicates the engagement that you have on that platform. There are different geographies where the messaging platforms are stronger," he said.

Zuckerberg said it was "still early on the monetization side" for WhatsApp.

Facebook also reported metrics for Stories for WhatsApp and Instagram, each of which have 250 million daily users. More users of course supports Facebook's ad business, which received $9.16bn in revenues, up 47 percent year-on-year.

Read more on WhatsApp

Editorial standards