In this article, I’m going to share with you reasons why people use WhatsApp instead of texting with the ordinary messaging (SMS) app on their phones.
But before,
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What is WhatsApp?
WhatsApp is a free simple, fast, secure messaging platform that has more than 2 billion users in over 180 countries. People all over the world use WhatsApp to stay in touch with friends and family, anytime and anywhere.
Unlike the SMS/text messaging system, WhatsApp does not depend on a cellular network to operate, all you need to a connection to the internet and you can text right away!
WhatsApp was started by Jan Koum and Brian Acton in 2009 as an alternative to SMS. Now it supports sending and receiving a variety of media: text, photos, videos, documents, and location, as well as voice calls.
Why Do People Prefer Whatsapp To SMS?
- WhatsApp is easy to access; completely free to download and to seamlessly send/receive messages, and voice or video chat with your family and friends, both locally and internationally. And you can do all this without needing a sim card since it uses your phone’s Internet connection to send messages, therefore you can avoid SMS fees.
- With WhatsApp, you can easily create groups; send messages, and share files in a group of up to 256 participants. All these participants can also chat at the same time, something nonexistent in SMS.
Users can also Broadcast a single message to multiple people at once.
- Text messages have a limit on the number of characters/words you can include in your text message, the more you exceed the limit on each text box, the higher you will be charged. With WhatsApp however, you can easily send a long note without any limit and without incurring any extra fees.
- Whatsapp users can easily make audio and video calls without having to install a separate app (Skype for example) for this purpose, and you can do this even if you’re on a limited data plan.
- WhatsApp gives users the ability to share multiple pictures, files, audio and video files with your contacts, all of which you can’t do with SMS. Additionally, you can share your files quickly even if have a slow internet connection.
- With WhatsApp, you can check the status of your sent messages. You can see if the person you sent a message to has received and opened the message. This depends on whether you have enabled the read receipts on your account or not.
- Whatsapp enables users to share their location/address using GPS or Google Maps. The recipient can just click on the message, open Maps, and then follow the map to reach the destination sent.
- You can update your bio and your profile picture so that your contacts can know who they’re talking to. It helps people who have just added your contact as well.
- WhatsApp allows document sharing, users can send PDFs, documents, spreadsheets, slideshows and more, without hassling with email or file-sharing apps. You can send documents of up to 100 MB, which is not so with SMS.
- WhatsApp has a lot of options and features compared to the default SMS app. Features like emojis, gifs, stickers and other gestures that aren’t included in text messaging.
- Whatsapp messages are stored in a structured format which makes the content easily searchable; say you’re trying to find something specific in your chat history, there’s a search box option that enables you to find what you want very smoothly.
- Whatsapp has a unique feature; WhatsApp Web which enables cross-compatibility, meaning you to use WhatsApp on your tablet/laptop/PC. With Whatsapp Web, you can seamlessly sync all of your chats to your computer so that you can chat on whatever device is most convenient for you.
- Whatsapp offers great business options with Whatsapp Business. You can use your WhatsApp Business account to create a catalogue to display your products, market/promote your business as well as provide quick support to your clients and deliver important notifications to them.
- WhatsApp is considerably safer and more secure than SMS because of its built-in end-to-end encryption. This means your messages and calls are secured so that only you and the person you’re communicating with can read or listen to them, nobody in between can, not even WhatsApp.
Even More Reasons Why People Use WhatsApp Instead Of Texting
- With WhatsApp, you can easily know when your contacts were last active.
- Unlike normal text messaging, Whatsapp texts can be sent and unsent according to your convenience, of course within a specified period.
- You can also use the Whatsapp payment feature to send or receive money.
- Whatsapp is perfect for a quick hello or a longer story through voice messaging. You can do this with just one tap of a button.
- Whatsapp also offers additional security and privacy control features like two-step verification, Touch ID, Face ID, or Android fingerprint lock, block and report spam options, disappearing messages, etc.
- With the WhatsApp backup and recovery feature, users are able to save their chats and media and export them or send them to themselves via email, or even retrieve this data in case of a loss or change of device. You can also set up regular backups for your chats.
- WhatsApp enables you to customize your messages, for example, you can use bold, italics, and
strikethroughin your texts.
In conclusion,
Before we wrap up this article, let’s look at some of the downsides of WhatsApp because just like any other app, it’s not perfect. For example;
- Whatsapp is prone to hackers, spammers, and fraudsters who misuse the app for their mischief.
- You can’t have multiple WhatsApp accounts on one device and phone number.
- Sometimes, Whatsapp backups might fail to transfer all chats to a new device, leading to information loss.
So, Whatsapp, while without its downsides, seems to be a much preferred messaging platform to text messaging by most people, due to the multiple features and functionalities it offers.
