WhatsApp overtakes Facebook as number one choice for social messaging on mobile
WhatsApp has been named the mobile social messaging platform of choice, taking over Facebook which has until now been the global market leader.
On Device’s five-country research revealed that in the US Facebook still dominates, but WhatsApp is the combined leader with 44 per cent of global respondents who use social messaging saying they do so on WhatsApp compared to 35 per cent on Facebook Messenger. WeChat was the third most popular (28 per cent) followed by Twitter (19 per cent), BlackBerry Messenger (17 per cent) and Skype (16 per cent).
Daily usage of social messaging on mobile devices also shows that chat apps are the dominant way of staying in touch. 86 per cent of respondents say they use chat apps on their mobiles, compared to 73 per cent using their devices for voice calls, 75 per cent using SMS and 60 per cent using email.
On Device used the mobile internet to survey 3,759 Android and iOS smartphone owners across US, Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia and China.
Data collection took place between 25 October and 10 November, 2013.