[lawik]

Even if the team is lean the article made the product seem very heavy, all-in-one. I have a hard time seeing success with that in the west these days. Feature-filled communities was definitely a big thing once.

I get that a partnered article won't cover these kinds of practices. However it does leave a bad taste in my mouth to see this unapologetic praise in the article for what seems to be a monolithic monopoly play.

[rahimnathwani]

"the article made the product seem very heavy, all-in-one"

This is what amazes me. WeChat has lots and lots of features, but doesn't feel heavy at all. The messaging UI is both clean (no unnecessary clutter; snappy) and feature-rich (can send text, start a voice chat, send money, send a voice message). Some of the other features that you might not use every day (like paying utility bills, topping up mobile) are in a separate 'Wallet' section which actually looks a bit like the Alipay app.

[anuh]

It is not a monopoly play by any means. Alipay is a big competitor of TencentPay and bigger than WeChatPay. Also though the app supports so many features and services, it has a really simple UI. The user has to go hunt the various features and they don't send too many push notifications either. You have to really know the ins and outs of it to know where to access some of the features.

[frik]

WeChat actually feels very light and has a way better UI than WhatsApp and Facebook Chat - though they rather slowly now copy it from WeChat. Crazy times, as now US has to copy the Chinese competition which is now like 2-3 years ahead.

[Markoff]

it's ahead only if you think those markets are comparable, people outside China don't desire this functinality since they have many other good options, people in China has horrible options so WeChat looks actually pretty good to them and they use additional functionality on top of chat/wall

I lived in China since beginning of growth of WeChat and could see it in front of my eyes, in beginning it was very simple messenger and they kept growing userbase and adding more and more functionality, though you end up being locked in in their ecosystem, as was mentioned taobao links are blocked and those options under Wallet section are mostly not the best value, so I pretty much avoided those added functionality. Heck I rather top up electricity through Alipay, since it was easier than WeChat or some companies didn't have contracts with them.

anyway back to your comment, you say they are ahead of Whatsapp and Facebook, but please tell me in what exactly they are ahead, in selling tickets, paying utilities and sending money through messenger app? do people outside China desire this? if people don't desire it, they are not ahead, people in west have fast wire transfers, can pay pretty much anywhere in card so there is no necessity for such functionality, I could go on and on if you tell me in what area they are exactly ahead since I lived in China for years and I live in west so I can compare

Yes, WeChat is extremely convenient for life in China. Is it convenient and good app for life outside China? Hell no, I don't want and I don't need those features from Messenger, since we don't have blocked internet I can visit whatever website I want and use their services without state protectionism.

[eratins]

Strange that you're being downvoted as I found this to be true too.