Quick Answer
What is the most used messaging app in 2025?
WhatsApp is the leading messaging app in terms of number of people using it– with 2 billion monthly active users.
Let’s find out the most used messaging app by country in 2025.
Messaging apps are becoming extremely popular worldwide. More people are using various messaging apps to easily connect with other people.
A recent report shows that there were 3.32 billion messaging app users in 2021, up by more than 1 billion from 2016.
Most Used Messaging App by Country in 2025
Curious to know what is the most used messaging app?
According to the April 2022 data, among the 90 examined countries, WhatsApp was the leading messaging app in terms of users.
It was the most popular messaging app in 60 countries. Facebook Messenger ranks second, being the most popular messaging app in 13 countries.
While Telegram was the most popular messaging app in 8 countries.
Similar to the most-used messaging app, WhatsApp was also the most popular messaging app worldwide in 2021, based on monthly active users.
Approximately 2 billion people use this messaging app monthly.
Here are the most popular messaging apps in the world as of January 2022, in terms of monthly active users:
- WhatsApp has recorded 2 billion monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
- WeChat has recorded 1.263 billion monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
- Facebook Messenger has recorded 988 million monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
- QQ has recorded 574 million monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
- Snapchat has recorded 557 million monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
- Telegram has recorded 550 million monthly active users worldwide as of January 2022
Most Used Messaging App in USA
The United States is one of the biggest sharers of messaging app usage.
Facebook Messenger is the leading messaging app in the country in 2021. It acquires more than 64% market share.
Below is a list of the messaging app market share by usage in the US in 2021:
- Facebook Messenger acquired a usage market share of 64.43% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- Snapchat acquired a usage market share of 13.59% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- WhatsApp acquired a usage market share of 13.56% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- WeChat acquired a usage market share of 4.94% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- Discord acquired a usage market share of 1.51% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- Telegram acquired a usage market share of 1.47% in the US messaging app market in 2021
- Signal acquired a usage market share of 0.51% in the US messaging app market in 2021
Most Used Messaging App in UK
Facebook Messenger was the most used messaging app in the United Kingdom in 2021.
It acquires more than half of the country’s messaging app market. While the second most used was WhatsApp, with over 25%.
Here is the messaging app market share by usage in the UK in 2021:
- Facebook Messenger handled 54.90% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- WhatsApp handled 25.59% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- Snapchat handled 13.09% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- WeChat handled a 3.84% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- Telegram handled a 1.05% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- Discord handled a 1.01% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
- Signal handled 0.52% market share by usage in the UK messaging app market in 2021
Most Used Messaging App in India
Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp dominate India’s messaging app market share in 2021. More than 90% were from the market shares of these apps.
Here are the market shares of messaging apps in India, by usage:
- Facebook Messenger had a market share of 54.62% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- WhatsApp had a market share of 38.19% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- Snapchat had a market share of 4.73% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- Telegram had a market share of 1.89% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- Signal had a market share of 0.32% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- Discord had a market share of 0.19% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
- Viber had a market share of 0.05% in India’s messaging app market in 2021, based on usage
Most Used Messaging App in Singapore
Messaging apps in Singapore are the leading mobile phone apps used every day.
80% of people use various messaging apps through mobile phones.
This country has 5.3 million social media users in 2022, up by 6.9% from the previous year.
WhatsApp is the most used messaging app and social media platform in Singapore in 2022, with 83.7% of monthly users.
Here is a list of the most-used messaging app and social media platforms in Singapore in 2022:
- 83.7% of Singapore’s internet users use WhatsApp monthly
- 79.4% of Singapore’s internet users use Facebook monthly
- 66.3% of Singapore’s internet users use Instagram monthly
- 49.2% of Singapore’s internet users use Telegram monthly
- 46.6% of Singapore’s internet users use Facebook Messenger monthly
Most Used Messaging App in China
WeChat remains to be the most used social networking service and messaging app in China in 2022.
Among the 983.3 million social media users in the country, 77% use WeChat every month.
Below are the most-used social networking services and messaging apps in China in 2022:
- 77% of China’s internet users use WeChat every month
- 70.2% of China’s internet users use Douyin every month
- 61.5% of China’s internet users use QQ every month
- 57% of China’s internet users use Baidu Tieba every month
- 50.7% of China’s internet users use Sina Weibo every month
Messaging App Annual Users
The number of messaging app users annually is constantly growing.
They exceeded 3 billion in 2020 and continuously grew the following year.
In 2021, approximately 3.32 billion people used at least one of the messaging apps worldwide.
The three major messaging apps in 2022 based on users are WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and WeChat.
Here is a list of the number of messaging app annual users from 2016 to 2021:
- In 2016, there were 2.11 billion messaging app annual users
- In 2017, there were 2.38 billion messaging app annual users
- In 2018, there were 2.52 billion messaging app annual users
- In 2019, there were 2.81 billion messaging app annual users
- In 2020, there were 3.19 billion messaging app annual users
- In 2021, there were 3.32 billion messaging app annual users
Most Downloaded Messaging Apps
The most downloaded messaging app from 2019 to 2021 was WhatsApp, acquiring 643 million downloads in 2019, around 669 million in 2020, and 437 million in 2021.
Although the number of WhatsApp downloads decreases compared to the previous years, WhatsApp remains to be the most downloaded messaging app in 2021.
Below are the top messaging apps with the most downloads in 2021:
- WhatsApp had 437 million total downloads in 2021
- Telegram had 359 million total downloads in 2021
- Snapchat had 323 million total downloads in 2021
- Facebook Messenger had 238 million total downloads in 2021
- Discord had 113 million total downloads in 2021
- Signal had 64 million total downloads in 2021
- WeChat had 55 million total downloads in 2021
- Viber had 44 million total downloads in 2021
- LINE had 40 million total downloads in 2021
- KakaoTalk had 10 million total downloads in 2021
Conclusion
The global outbreak of COVID-19 drove more people to use messaging apps.
Users find ways to connect with others since everyone stays inside their homes. More people use messaging apps to send real-time messages through the internet.
Some of these apps improved their services by adding video calls, voice clips, group chats, images, and live locations.
Currently, more than 3 billion people worldwide use messaging apps.
Thanks for reading our article about the most used messaging app by country in 2025.
