It seems like the period of sending SMS’s or MMS with the stock messaging apps on our cellphones is witnessing a complete revolution. The traditional way of sending SMS’s to phone inboxes have considerably altered with third-party apps such as Chomp SMS and more. In fact, most of our conversations these days take place on such messaging apps for our Android devices, unlike before. And surely this evolution has grown much larger over the years, thus offering us more additional facilities.
Nowadays, as we rely mostly on these applications for our conversations, it is obvious to look for the best messaging apps for our devices. This article lists some of the most reliable messaging apps for Android that are sure to provide you the best of your experiences.
10 Best Messaging Apps for Android
1. Google Messages
Price: Free
OS: Android
Popularity: 1,000,000,000+ downloads
Google message is an official messaging app from Google. The app looks simple and has a user-friendly interface. It comes with the readability of texting, along with the richness of chat. You can text your families and friends from anywhere and even set up group chats to keep in touch with your loved ones. Google messages bring some of the most outstanding features, hence allowing you to send SMS and MMS. You can further send and receive texts over Wi-Fi and mobile network using RCS. Besides, Messages also supports easy sharing of images, videos and even enables you to send voice notes. You can send rich emojis to fill excitement to your texts and make payments via Google Pay as well.
Download: Google Messages
2. Band
Price: Free/ in-app purchases
OS: Android
Popularity: 50,000,000+ downloads
If you are looking for an application, especially for group chats, BAND is the most recommended one on this list. The developers have crafted the app, focusing on providing the best group chatting service. Fortunately, it offers an intuitive platform for group discussion. Whether it is a sports group, workgroup, school group, or just a hangout group, the members can freely go with their conversation without any interruption. It helps you stay socially active and connected to others. BAND even allows organizing your groups into different channels or message anyone individually.
Downloads: BAND
3. Whatsapp Messenger
Price: Free
OS: Android
Popularity: 5,000,000,000+ downloads
Surely, the name WhatsApp doesn’t need any sort of additional introduction. It is the most widely used messaging app throughout the world. WhatsApp offers all its brilliant services completely free of cost. The first positive point for this application is it’s the excessively easy and sleek interface. It allows you to effortlessly chat with anyone on your contact list, having a WhatsApp account with the same number. You can exchange texts, emojis, GIF’s, videos, images, audio clips, and voice messages. Apart from a simple text application, it further comes with the ability to make audio and video calls over the internet. WhatsApp also includes two-factor authentication, which ensures your utter protection. So, all your private conversations remain private with WhatsApp.
Download: WhatsApp
4. Discord
Price: Free/ $9.99 per month or $99.99 per annum
OS: Android
Popularity: 100,000,000+ downloads
Probably the one and only best platform for gamers to meet new people from all over the world and get to know each other well. Discord is a messaging app with cross-platform support across various smartphones and desktops. It allows you to create your own server and invite your group to keep in touch and have fun over text, voice, and video calls. The voice chat feature of Discord is extremely good and comes with support for GIF and a few other fun stuff. Although Discord services are free in every way, yet certain features need to be unlocked via its Nitro subscription. The platform was specially built to form gaming communities. However, people use it for various purposes, mainly for its outstanding capabilities.
Download: Discord
5. Chomp SMS
Price: Free/ in-app purchase
OS: Android
Popularity: 10,000,000+ downloads
Chomp is a simple and lightweight Android messaging app. The best part about it is Chomp only takes less than 10MB of memory of your device and yet provides its delicious service with no issues. The app comes with tons of astonishing features, thereby fulfilling all your requirements from a messaging app. It supports passcode lock, scheduled SMS sender, stop while sending messages, robust privacy settings, blocklisting, signatures, SMS blocker, text snippets, and more. Chomp messenger not only stops there, but it is also an ultra-customizable application. It offers unlimited customizing options enabling you to effortlessly change the notification LED colors, change the ringtone, vibrate patterns, text size and color, background layout, and so on.
Download: Chomp SMS
6. Facebook Messenger
Price: Free
OS: Android
Popularity: 1,000,000,000+ downloads
Messenger app from Facebook is another popular messaging app after WhatsApp, which has a huge user base. It is basically an all-in-one communication app that includes text messaging service, Voice call, and video calling service. You can further create a group video call with up 4 people max. Facebook Messenger comes with all the basic features such as support for emojis, GIFs, images, and videos. The Chat Head feature is one of my favorite that lets you easily access it whenever someone writes to you or send any message. Besides, it also features a dark theme that reduces the strain on your eyes, especially during the night. The newer update has also introduced a Vanish Mode, which lets you send messages that last for only a certain moment and then automatically vanish.
Download: Facebook Messenger
7. Handcent Next SMS
Price: Free/ in-app purchase
OS: Android
Popularity: 1,000,000+ downloads
Next, we have the Handcent Next SMS, an Android messaging app. It has undergone quite a few transitions over the past few years. And now, with the latest update, the app seems to have a stabilized environment in terms of its interface, performance, and features, of course. It comes with unlimited message customization to meet the accuracy of your preferences. Apart from individual messaging, you can also create groups and start a fruitful conversation with your friends and family. Handcent also offers free cloud backup, a strong guard, and support for Android wear the device. Besides, you can enrich your messages by using hundreds of cool emojis, stickers, and GIFs. Moreover, the messaging app also lets you exchange MMS and full-size multimedia with MMS Plus.
Download: Handcent Next SMS
8. Telegram
Price: Free
OS: Android
Popularity: 500,000,000+ downloads
Concerned about your privacy? Well, Telegram must be your ultimate solution. This messenger is specifically built, keeping in mind the complete privacy protection of the users. Telegram is a simple, reliable, and powerful messaging app that comes with support for file sharing, emoji, stickers, GIF, and group chat. It supports up to 200,000 members per group. Hence proper usage of mentions and hashtags are a must while replying to the group. Unlike other messaging apps, Telegram allows you to share large videos and various types of documents, be it Docs, ZIP, MP3, or any other. Besides, it also features a powerful photo and video editor and many more stellar features that make it one of its kind.
Download: Telegram
9. Slack
Price: Free/ Business account at $6.67 – $12.50 per user
OS: Android
Popularity: 10,000,000+ downloads
Slack is a productive messaging app ideal for business purposes. It almost like a more refined version of Discord that has a sleek and gentle look along with a professional feel. It allows you to effortlessly communicate with your teams or groups and organize your conversations as per any particular topic, project, or so. You can also create groups, establish video calls, share documents, and collaborate with the right person at the right time. Slack also supports a few third-party apps such as Google Drive, Dropbox, Asana, Twitter, etc. Above all; Slack offers most of its services for free just like Discord; however, in case you have a much larger team and have the need for certain advanced functionalities, you can opt for its subscription plan which is optional.
Downloads: Slack
10. Skype
Price: Free/ in-app purchase
OS: Android
Popularity: 1,000,000,000+ downloads
Skype is a very popular name when it comes to the most reliable video calling applications. However, it also includes the ability to send and receive text messages, make voice calls, and even make normal calls to anyone from your contact list. Skype features a very user-friendly interface, and the quality of video calls is exceptional. Besides, it also supports the sharing of various types of files and documents. You can also use several emojis, Giphy’s to make your conversation look interesting. It provides all its services for no cost. However, the free version supports ads, which is, after all, not that much of a big deal.
Download: Skype
From Editor’s Desk
Unlike the regular messaging apps on our cellphones, the third-party apps come with certain much higher specifications. And for Android devices, these were the top 10 messaging apps picks as per their usability, performance, features, and of course, from the pricing point of view. Do let us know if we missed out on something special.
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