⚡ Instant Messaging Apps

Instant messaging apps allow users to communicate in real time via text, voice, and video, often with group chats, file sharing, and end-to-end encryption.

They can be broadly categorized into traditional chat services (WhatsApp), social media messengers (Facebook Messenger, Snapchat), privacy-focused messengers (Signal, Threema), and workplace collaboration tools (Slack, Microsoft Teams).

According to our statistics, instant messaging apps are detected on 8.3% of all websites.
85.3% of these sites use only one instant messaging app, 13.4% use two, and 1.3% use three or more of them.

⭐ Most Popular in 2026

The following chart shows the leading instant messaging apps on the web in 2026, based on market share.

The most popular is WhatsApp with an impressive share of 48.9%, followed by Telegram with 26.5% and Messenger with 9.2%.

WhatsApp 48.9%
Telegram 26.5%
Messenger 9.2%
Line 8.6%
Discord 5.4%
WeChat 3.5%
QQ 3.3%
Viber 3%
Zalo 2.7%
KakaoTalk 1.3%
Snapchat 1.2%
Zoom 0.6%
Slack 0.5%
Microsoft Teams 0.4%
Max 0.3%

You can also drill down by country:

🚀 Country Highlights

Here is a list of apps that are especially popular in certain countries.
Differences between global and country rankings are shown in parentheses.

Telegram is #1 in Russia ^(-1)
Messenger is #1 in Poland ^(-2)
Line is #1 in Japan ^(-3)
WeChat is #1 in Hong Kong ^(-5)
QQ is #1 in China ^(-6)
Viber is #1 in Serbia ^(-7)
Zalo is #1 in Vietnam ^(-8)
KakaoTalk is #1 in Korea ^(-9)
Discord is #2 in France ^(-3)
Snapchat is #2 in Saudi Arabia ^(-9)

✨ Best Instant Messaging Apps

Below is a more detailed list of the top 25 of the 26 instant messaging apps we track, ranked by their market share.

Available filters: Business Privacy Superapp

Rank	Name	Market share
1	WhatsApp Menlo Park, California, United States An instant messaging and Voice over IP service owned by Meta. Free	48.9%
2	Telegram Dubai, United Arab Emirates A cloud-based messaging app for mobile and desktop platforms focused on security, speed, and privacy. Free$$$	26.5%
3	Messenger Menlo Park, California, United States An instant messaging service developed by Meta, available on Android, iOS, and web platforms. Free	9.2%
4	Line Tokyo, Japan A Japanese instant messaging and social networking app often described as a super-app because it integrates services such as a digital wallet, news feed, digital comics, media streaming, and shopping. Free	8.6%
5	Discord San Francisco, California, United States An instant messaging and VoIP social platform that allows users to communicate via text chat, voice, and video. Free$2.99+	5.4%
6	WeChat Shenzhen, China A Chinese instant messaging, social media, and mobile payment app that has evolved into a super-app combining communication, commerce, and everyday services. Free	3.5%
7	QQ Shenzhen, China A Chinese instant messaging software platform. Free	3.3%
8	Viber Tokyo, Japan A free, cross-platform instant messaging and calling application owned by Rakuten. Free	3%
9	Zalo Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam A Vietnamese mobile instant messenger and social media service. Free99,000 VND+/month	2.7%
10	KakaoTalk Jeju-si, Jeju-do, Korea A Korean instant messenger for chats and real-time voice and video calls. Free	1.3%
11	Snapchat Santa Monica, California, United States A messaging and social networking app that lets users send photos and videos ("Snaps") that disappear after being viewed by default. Free	1.2%
12	Zoom San Jose, California, United States A cloud-based communications platform that enables video meetings, audio conferencing, phone calls, and team chat across devices. Free$15.99+/user/month	0.6%
13	Slack San Francisco, California, United States A cloud-based team communication platform for businesses, currently owned by Salesforce. Free$8.75+/month	0.5%
14	Microsoft Teams Redmond, Washington, United States A proprietary business collaboration platform built for hybrid work, offering chat, video conferencing, file storage, and application integration. Free$9.99+/month	0.4%
15	Max Moscow, Russia An instant messaging app from Russia, integrated into the country's national IT ecosystem. Free	0.3%
16	Matrix London, United Kingdom A set of open APIs for open-federated Instant Messaging, Voice over IP and Internet of Things communication. Free	0.2%
17	Gitter London, United Kingdom An open source chat and networking platform for software developers based on the Matrix protocol. Free	0.08%
18	IRC A text-based chat system for instant messaging supported by many clients such as mIRC, XChat, ChatZilla and others. Free	0.07%
19	RingCentral Belmont, California, United States A business communications platform that includes contact center and AI-powered phone, video, event management, and automation solutions. $20+/user/month	0.07%
20	Webex San Jose, California, United States A cloud-based video conferencing and collaboration solution that enables users to hold online meetings, video calls, webinars, and team conversations with integrated chat and collaboration features. Free$14.50+/user/month	0.06%
21	Rocket.Chat Wilmington, Delaware, United States An open-source communication platform designed for organizations with high security, privacy, and data sovereignty requirements that supports real-time chat, voice, and video across web, desktop, and mobile clients. FreeOpen source$$$	0.04%
22	Signal Mountain View, California, United States An open source, privacy-focused messaging app for instant messaging, voice calls, and video calls. FreeOpen source	0.04%
23	XMPP Parker, Colorado, United States A set of open technologies for instant messaging, presence, multi-party chat, voice and video calls, and collaboration.	0.02%
24	GG Koszalin, Poland A Polish instant messaging client originally known as Gadu-Gadu that uses a proprietary protocol to connect users for real-time chat across desktop, web, and mobile apps. Free100 PLN+/month	0.02%
25	Threema Pfäffikon, Schwyz, Switzerland A commercial, cross-platform instant messaging app focused on privacy and security. $6.99+	0.01%

👉 See Also

🔗 Links
- Instant messaging

Data is based on the analysis of 3,244,356 websites.
Statistics were last calculated on February 15, 2026.
For details, see our methodology and disclaimer.