A new instant-messaging service has arrived on the overseas app market and WeChat may be about to get a run for its money.

Player two has entered the game

WeChat is no longer the most-downloaded free message centre, as China’s Apple App Store shows Bullet Message shoots straight to number one.

Chinese internet giant Tencent has been dominating the message market for sometime with WeChat as more than 1 billion users rely on the app everyday to hail cabs, make reservations, and pay bills.

To Tencent’s surprise, Smartisan’s Bullet Message has surpassed their own service with a much simpler design, offering new features such as sending text messages instead of WeChat’s soundbites.

Speech vs text

As some may not be aware, WeChat uses “push to talk” to capture short voice recordings and send to other contacts, however it becomes problematic when working in quiet public locations.

Chinese AI companies iFlytek and Trio were contracted by Bullet Message to quickly translate voice to text in Mandarin along with other Chinese dialects, with more to be added in the future. Slick.

Bullet Chat is also bringing in more members by allowing users to invite others via QR codes shared within WeChat. Unless WeChat can pivot with some clone features there could be a mass migration on the horizon. Are you ready?

Have you heard of Bullet Chat? Would you prefer a voice to text function for instant messaging? Let us know what you think in our comment section.