Messaging Apps Have Overtaken SMS for the First Time

Messaging apps such as WhatsApp and iMessage overtook SMS for the first in 2012, according to research from Informa. It's estimated that 19 billion messages were sent per day via chat apps in 2012 versus 17.6 billion via SMS.

BBC notes that research firm Ovum calculated that more than $23bn (£15bn) of SMS revenue was lost in 2012 due to popularity of chat apps.

Informa projects 50 billion messages will be sent per day by chat apps in 2014 versus 21 billion SMS messages. Ms Clark-Dickson of Informa says, "there is a lot of life still in SMS" especially for emerging economies who primarily use normal phones.


"They don't have mobile data plans, so there is an awfully big base of mobile phone users who are going to still find that SMS is the best messaging experience for them for a while," she added.

Also, businesses are said to prefer SMS as it can be used on all mobile phones. "There are a few things that, I think, will keep the SMS alive for a few years yet," said Clark-Dickson.

SMS revenue is expected to grow to $127 billion by 2016, from $115 billion last year.

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