Facebook Messenger Surpasses 800 Million Users, Previews 2016

In an official blog post, Facebook’s VP of Messaging Products David Marcus has today announced that Facebook Messenger has surpassed 800 million monthly active users, up from 700 million in June, while offering a look back at 2015 and a preview of what to expect in 2016. He also highlighted what Messenger accomplished in 2015, such as video calling, conversation customization with colors, nicknames, and emoji, customer service via Messenger, M virtual assistant and more.

Marcus also shared what to look ahead as we enter 2016. He said that SMS was born out of the flip phone era and now we need chat for the smartphone era. He added that Messenger is devising new ways to “interact with businesses or services to buy items (and then buy more again), order rides, purchase airline tickets, and talk to customer service in truly frictionless and delightful ways.”

“You can expect us to keep trying new things, too. Our test of M, our digital virtual assistant, powered by human-trained AI, is going well. It’s still very, very early days, but the growing AI capabilities are bringing unparalleled convenience to simple, every day tasks like booking a restaurant, sending flowers, and making plans. There will be more innovative developments to come from Messenger this year.”

You can read more about Facebook’s plans at this link.