WhatsApp hits 600 million monthly active users, say Jan Koum

Popular mobile messaging service WhatsApp has crossed 600 million monthly active users, CEO Jan Koum has announced. In April the user base of the app was at 500 million monthly active users, which means it has added 100 million users in just four months.

WhatsApp's CEO and founder Jan Koum tweeted the achievement on Monday and in doing so highlighted that the number represents people who actually use the app on a regular basis, rather than how many times the title has been downloaded and installed on a tablet or smartphone.

Now serving 600,000,000 monthly active users. Yes, active and registered are very different types of numbers...
— jan koum (@jankoum) August 25, 2014

When the company was snapped up by Facebook in February for $19 billion, many thought that it would mark the beginning of the end for the social messaging app, as a connection with Facebook could cause users to desert the platform. However, it appears nothing could be further from the truth.

And with 600 million users sending texts, images, videos and emojis on a regular basis, it is now the world's most popular social messaging app.

The app crossed the significant half a billion user milestone in April this year. Tencent’s WeChat app is closest behind with 438 million active users, most of whom are likely in China, while Tango (70 million active users) and Viber (100 million active users) are among a clutch of other apps further back.

When WhatsApp comes to India, the company seems to have done quite well. The company has added more than 10 million users in the last three months alone and now the number of its Indian subscriber is around 60 million users. This means 10 percent of its users are from India.