Truecaller, which has been an Indian fan favourite for screening calls from unknowns and spammers, announced that it has started rolling out free voice calling feature to its Android users. The company is expecting to reach all of its Android user base in the coming days. The feature will be available soon for iOS devices.
The feature has been quite sought after. Truecaller’s users are making a whooping 180 Million phone calls daily from the app’s custom dialler. These users have been demanding the ability to make calls right from the app, and hence the feature.
“We are ecstatic with the launch of Truecaller Voice. We have been working towards building a full communication suite for our users and voice calling is the next big step in line with this mission”, said Rishit Jhunjhunwala, VP of Product at Truecaller
The feature is set to resonate the most with Truecaller’s massive Indian audience. It has a wide user base in India, about 70% of its users belong to the subcontinent. The feature comes at a time, when the company is looking to position itself as a one-stop communication suite, with no additional app requirements. In recent years, it has added messaging, mobile payments and call recording features. It also provides Indian users with the credit option to borrow few hundred dollars, a feature that was introduced earlier this year.
A company representative said that Truecaller began exploring the free voice calling feature a few months ago. It began testing the new functionality with alpha and beta test group users four weeks ago. It now plans to introduce group voice calling support soon, the company said.
With the launch of voice calling, Truecaller now competes even more closely with WhatsApp. The Facebook-owned app added voice calling function in 2015. Last year, Facebook said users around the world were spending 2 billion minutes per day on WhatsApp video and audio calls.
