WhatsApp: 22 Interesting Facts You Might Not Have Known

Imagine a world without WhatsApp. It’s a fact that it would be hard to do that in our technology-driven society. If you own a smartphone, you’ve probably used WhatsApp to send someone a message, voice note, audio clip, animated GIF or video clip.

There’s probably a lot that you don’t know about this popular Instant Messaging service, so I thought that I would undertake the task of informing you about it.

Here are 22 facts that you might not have known about WhatsApp

1. WhatsApp was founded in 2009 by Brian Acton and Jan Koum (former employees of Yahoo!).

2. The company did not spend a penny on marketing and user acquisition. They invested it in development instead.

3. The instant messaging service had 250,000 active users by June 2009. By December 2013 that number had gone up to 400 million.

4. The company turned down a $10 billion offer from Google, but they eventually accepted a $19 billion offer from Facebook in February 2014.

5. The messaging service is currently banned in 12 countries. Yes folks, you can’t use it in North Korea, Cuba, China, Iran, Syria, Qatar, The United Arab Emirates and 5 other countries.

6. According to 99firms, WhatsApp currently has 1.5 billion active users in 180 countries.

7. As of June 2021, India had the most WhatsApp users in the world, with 487.5 million monthly active users. That’s about one third of India’s population. This is more than the combined user base of the next two countries, Brazil and Indonesia.

8. 65 Billion Messages are sent per day on the app. That’s about 29 million messages per minute.

9. Two billion minutes are spent making voice and video calls per day on the app.

10. 55 million video calls are made per day on the app. The calls last roughly 340 million minutes in total.

11. It’s the most widely used instant messaging app on the planet. It has 200 million more users than Facebook Messenger.

12. More than 1 million new users register to use the app daily.

13. The average user checks the app more than 23 times per day.

14. According to January 2024 statistics, there are 98 million WhatsApp users in the United States. Around 23% of adults use the application, or roughly one in every four adults. WhatsApp is currently the fourth most downloaded mobile app in the US.

15. The company has 55 employees and 50 engineers. They still don’t employ any marketing or PR staff.

16. The app was originally developed for iOS. It eventually became available to Android users in 2010.

17. The Android version of the app supports 60 languages.

18. WhatsApp is worth more than NASA, Harley Davidson, or American Airlines. NASA is valued at $17 billion, Harley Davidson Motorcycles at $14.1 billion, and American Airlines has a market value of $12.3 billion.

19. Users spend 195 minutes on average on WhatsApp weekly.

20. According to 2022 statistics, WhatsApp is the most popular social media platform in South Africa, with 93% of internet users using the app. In 2021, WhatsApp’s user base in South Africa was 9.1 million, and by 2022 it had grown to 9.9 million. By 2025, Statista predicts that WhatsApp’s reach in South Africa will reach nearly 11.5 million users.

21. Projections show that there will be around 3 billion users of WhatsApp in 2024, representing 251 million more users from 2023, or a rise of 9%.

22. WhatsApp Business was launched in 2018 has received 352 million downloads so far. WhatsApp Business reached over 200 million downloads in 2021. According to projections, WhatsApp downloads will reach 476.82 million by 2025.

Well, there you have it, 22 facts that you might not have known about WhatsApp. I trust that you found this information useful. If you have, feel free to share it with your friends on Facebook and Twitter.

Watch this space for regular updates in the Facts category on Interesting Facts.

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