India is currently the fastest growing Internet market across the globe and Facebook considers the nation a burgeoning asset for its social networking platform. It has already amassed about 2 billion users internationally, which a rather massive monthly active user base but it still sees a lot of scope in the Indian market.
At its “Facebook: A Place to Connect” event organized in New Delhi, the social media giant announced that more than 184 million monthly active users are now using the platform in India. This is a notable figure considering only a quarter (meaning 300 million) people of our massive 1.3 billion population are connected to the internet. It has also been revealed that 50 percent of these users access Facebook every day — no standalone stats for the main and Lite app.
Talking about the same in an official statement, Facebook writes,
India is a very important country to Facebook, and we’re proud to have more than 184 million monthly active people in India who use Facebook to connect with their friends and family and to build supportive communities online and offline.
Starting off with Facebook Lite, this data-saving and mobile-focused replica of the social network was launched back in 2015. Over the past year, as per statistics shared by the company, the app has made its way to more than 200 million users spanning across 150 countries. And it counts India as one of the top countries where Facebook Lite has literally taken off.
Thus, the social media has today decided to bring the Lite mobile app a step closer to the experience provided on the core application. It has debuted the popular Reactions feature, which had previously been under beta testing to the Facebook Lite app. This means you will now have more options — which include Love, Haha, Wow, Sad and Angry — to react to the posts appearing on your timeline. The company also shared an insight saying that the Reactions feature has been used over 300 million times, Love making up for half of its total reactions.
Facebook, for those unaware, has steadily been porting over features from its widely popular competitor Snapchat into each one its product offerings. It has baked in the Stories features into every app, ranging from Instagram and Messenger to even WhatsApp. It has not only copied the concept but also specific features, the most prominent one being filters and face masks. It has released these camera effects for every user globally but is now introducing some local India-specific filters as well.
Announced at the New Delhi event, the users of Facebook in India will not only be able to access the camera effects already present within the app. They will now also be able to express themselves with new custom filters, such as the expression of Namaste or geo-specific experiences for Delhi, Mumbai, Goa, and other places. And now with the announcement of the AR-focused Camera Effects platform announced at the F8 developer conference, you should be looking forward to even immersive experiences.
The conference revolved around Facebook’s new-found vision, described in Zuckerberg’s lengthy 6000-word manifesto, of moving beyond connecting people to now building a community on their platform. It not only talked about new features or product releases but also showcased how users can indulge in numerous community-led efforts to increase engagement. The event also shed a light on other products owned by Facebook such as Live, 360 Photos, Groups, Events, Oculus, Instagram, and WhatsApp among others.
With regards to the same, it has already revealed that a social gathering of-sorts will be organized for Facebook Group admins at the Communities Summit later in June this year. This will entirely be focused on Facebook groups or community members, who’re out there building a community to reduce hate, abuse and help those in need. The social media giant will be unveiling new AI-powered tools, along with other solutions to help admins better manage the groups and increase interaction.
