WeChat grows to 549M monthly active users

Tencent revealed today that its messaging app WeChat now has 549 million monthly active users (MAUs). The figure is indicated in Tencent’s Q1 2015 earnings report.

549 million MAUs is up 9.8 percent from WeChat’s 500 million milestone at the end of 2014. It’s up 39 percent from Q1 2014.

Once again, Tencent did not provide a geographic breakdown of where WeChat users are based, so it’s hard to discern if the service has made any impact beyond China. In contrast, rival apps like WhatsApp (800 million MAUs), Viber (236 million MAUs), and Line (205 million MAUs) appear to have a more truly global following.

But Tencent is still pursuing overseas markets, saying in today’s report that the messaging app team “continued to drive user engagement in selected overseas markets.”

See: Strong Q1 results as Line metamorphoses from messenger to lifestyle service

Tencent’s online game revenues – covering social gaming on WeChat and QQ, as well as PC-based titles – increased by 28 percent year-on-year to RMB 13.3 billion (US$2.15 billion) in the first quarter of this year. The “increase was mainly driven by revenue growth from smartphone games,” said the company. No figure was provided just for WeChat’s revenues, which come from social gaming purchases, in-app purchases such as emojis, brand and service accounts, advertising in WeChat Moments, and ecommerce and epayments-related income.