The social media giant quietly launched and began testing for Facebook Lite, specifically for use in low end Android devices in several nations. Listed counties are Bangaladesh, Nepal, Nigeria, South Africa, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Zimbabwe (all notable non First World nations). It is speculated if this initiative is successful, the company might expand the app to several more countries in near future.
However, don’t let the name fool you, as it is still quite a capable app. The app is still able to function with features exclusive to Android such as push notifications, camera integration and so on, not too different from the full app that most of us enjoy. The size of the file is only 252kb in size and data usage is very low as it is optimized for 2G networks or areas with limited network reach.
More and more manufacturers are flocking to emerging markets like India, for example recently launched Google Android One. Furthermore, India is the fastest growing market for smartphone in fourth quarter in 2014. This is a prudent move for social media giants like Facebook to stay relevant with more users on board. So far, the app has had positive response in terms on numbers – 10,000 downloads so far with average rating of 4.6 from 693 reviewers now.
Facebook hasn’t yet made any announcement if they going to extend this app to Malaysia yet.
Source: TechCrunch
You might be interested in
The Windows Holographic is official
Now you can use Whatsapp on your desktop too
