Top apps like WhatsApp for Android, iOS and Windows

WhatsApp seems like it came with a wish to replace SMS and it clicked. More and more people started adopting the app as data charges plummeted and smart phones made it extremely convenient to use. They charge $0.99 annually to provide their users an ad free messaging experience. Recently they also launched the most awaited calling feature which lets you call someone over internet for free. However WhatsApp still lacks a few features that are high on the wishlist of many users. A few other apps like Whatsapp fulfill these wishes. Working on a similar design, a few others have launched apps that use your phone number to identify you and other users, don’t require email ids to be remembered, complex usernames or passwords. Just one phone number and you are sorted.

We list out a few top apps like WhatsApp

1. Viber

Viber, with over 516 million users, supports voice and video calling apart from conventional texting. It has support for sending stickers and emoticons. You can send videos, photos, location to your contacts. You can create a group or be a part of a group that can have 100 participants at a time. You can follow public chats of your favorite topics or celebrities. You can play games with Viber characters. There is a special feature called ‘viber out’ which lets you call someone on a mobile number at reasonable rates. The application supports Android Wear which lets you send and receive messages from your smart watch. It also have a desktop application for Windows, Mac and Linux 

 

Availability : Android / iOS / Windows Phone / Nokia / Blackberry

 

2. Hike

They claim, ” made with ❤ in India”. This app has an Indian flavor with Regional stickers, stickers from Hindi movies etc. Users can create a group of 500 members, send their conversation as free SMS if the contact is not online and even send files up to 100 MBs. The app supports sharing of other file formats too, such as .TXT, .PDF, .DOC etc. It has a hidden mode, which allows you to protect your private chats with a password. It has number of chat themes which you can change as per your choice. Special contacts can be added to favorites. Hike has to started supporting voice calls recently. It has an auto reply robot named Natasha. Hike has a tie up with certain brands under which they offer discount coupons under “Rewards/Extras” section. They claim to encrypt messages with 128-bit SSL encryption.

Availability : Android / iOS / Windows Phone / BlackBerry

3. Telegram

This is an app with all the basic functionalities with additional features like sending multiple file formats, starting a secret chat, emoticons etc. Users can share files up to 1.5 GBs. One feature because of which this app makes our list is cloud storage. The messages are encrypted and stored on cloud and can be restored instantly. It also has a built in video player to play shared YouTube videos right there in the app. This app allows multiple logins using different devices which include desktops running on all the major operating systems using their desktop application. You can manage your privacy settings. And build your own tools on their API (Application Program Interface). Currently this app doesn’t support voice or video calling, but because it has so many other features, it is a must have messaging app on your device.

Availability : Android / iOS/ Windows Phone / Web version

Remember, SMS is always there to rescue you when you do not have mobile data connectivity or when Wi-Fi isn’t available.

We hope that you will try these apps and share your reviews in comments and let’s see if our views match. We would also be glad to know about your experience with any app like WhatsApp that you may have. Anyway, if WhatsApp is getting too much for you, have a look at how to block someone on WhatsApp.