WeChat

WeChat (Chinese: 微信; pinyin:  Wēixìn; literally: "micro message") is a mobile text and voice messaging communication service developed by Tencent in China, first released in January 2011. It is one of the largest standalone messaging apps by monthly active users.

The app is available on Android, iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Phone and Symbian phones. Web-based OS X and Windows clients also exist; these however require the user to have the app installed on a supported mobile phone for authentication, and neither message roaming nor 'Moments' are provided. As of December 2015, WeChat has over a billion created accounts, 650 million active users; with 70 million outside of China.

WeChat provides text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video conferencing, video games, sharing of photographs and videos, and location sharing. It can exchange contacts with people nearby via Bluetooth, as well as providing various features for contacting people at random if desired (if these are open to it), next to integration with social networking services such as those run by Facebook and Tencent QQ. Photographs may also be embellished with filters and captions, and a machine translation service is available.