It’s not sure how many users have added Signal in recent days, but Apptopia said New York Times there were 1.3 million new signups on January 11 alone. Telegram also benefited from WhatsApp concerns and added 25 million new users in just three days.
WhatsApp claimed that the exodus was the result of confusion, and stressed that it could not read messages. However, the damage has already been done – many were convinced that WhatsApp would share conversations with its parent, Facebook.
The interruption of Signal and extensive recovery indicate that demand is still strong. It’s definitely a nice problem to have a relatively small service – the company had 20 million active users as of December, while WhatsApp had more than 2 billion users last February. The question is whether Signal can use the momentum or not after the noise.
Signal is back! Like an underdog going through a practice montage, we’ve learned a lot since yesterday – and we did it together. Thanks to the millions of new Signal users around the world for your patience. Your ability to understand inspired us as we expanded our capacity. pic.twitter.com/cRNV8kVtdF
– Sein (@signalapp) 17 January 2021