SMS was expensive in Brazil before Whatsapp. Furthermore, it took more than half an hour to a SMS arrive in most of the time, sometime more than a day.
A lot of people don't pay cellular data plan and use whatsapp on wifi.
Whatsapp arrived as a free service on android. The app was really fast even in slow smartphone. And uses your cellphone number as id, so it was really easy to know whom was using.
I made a lot of people to use whatapp, because it show if you had send the message and if the other person has read. A problem I had with SMS.
And others messengers? (IMHO)
* iMessage is restrict on iPhone and Android dominate market share in Brazil.
* Facebook Message was only put in a different app latter in the game. And Facebook App is a bloatware, so it is practically unused on slow smartphones.
* Skype app was slow and it didn't use your cellphone number, so I had to ask personally.
* Gtalk didn't synchronized messages correctly and I never saw someone outside tech people using it. (Hangout fix the first problem).
A few others tried: Kik, WeChat, zapzap (Brazilian messenger). But none has the mass use. Now days, even my gramma is using Whatapp, so it will be difficult to change.
Telegram is increasing the number of people. I had a lot of friends sign up during this blockage.
WhatsApp (or ZapZap as it is informally called here) used to work even in old Nokia phones (non android).
The Telcos cartel created a lot of "innovations" in Brazil. It is so expensive to call between different telcos, that people have multiple phones with multiple chips each.
Whatsapp arrived as a free service on android. The app was really fast even in slow smartphone. And uses your cellphone number as id, so it was really easy to know whom was using. I made a lot of people to use whatapp, because it show if you had send the message and if the other person has read. A problem I had with SMS.
And others messengers? (IMHO) * iMessage is restrict on iPhone and Android dominate market share in Brazil. * Facebook Message was only put in a different app latter in the game. And Facebook App is a bloatware, so it is practically unused on slow smartphones. * Skype app was slow and it didn't use your cellphone number, so I had to ask personally. * Gtalk didn't synchronized messages correctly and I never saw someone outside tech people using it. (Hangout fix the first problem).
A few others tried: Kik, WeChat, zapzap (Brazilian messenger). But none has the mass use. Now days, even my gramma is using Whatapp, so it will be difficult to change.
Telegram is increasing the number of people. I had a lot of friends sign up during this blockage.