Viber’s robust growth in Sri Lanka contributes to impressive performance for APAC region in 2020

Viber, one of the world’s leading apps for free and easy communication, has recorded an overall increase in app usage across the Asia Pacific (APAC) region in 2020, with Sri Lanka also contributing with usage gains.

In the Asia Pacific region, the application ended the year with a 421% growth of users in December 2020. In the same period, Viber also recorded a 509% growth in messages sent and a massive surge in messages sent to groups. Viber’s Communities Feature experienced the most robust growth in Community Messages Sent. These 2020 growth numbers were based on the data recorded in the same period in 2019, the company said in a media release.

All of these make 2020 one of Viber’s strongest years in its 10-year history as specific markets in the APAC region like Sri Lanka also logged notable growth rates.  The uptick in Viber Communities showcased an increase in interest by Sri Lankans as messages sent to communities grew by 85% while users who viewed communities also grew by a record 125%.

Crucial partnerships were also launched such as an e-commerce bot with the nation’s biggest supermarket chain Cargills Foodcity which enabled users to purchase essential goods to be delivered to their homes or picked up from their nearest outlet. They also launched a Viber bot and Community for the National Lottery Sri Lanka, a the bot that supports online purchases of lottery tickets with updates on official results and winners of the lottery. Vanitha Vasana, a product of the People’s Bank, which has one of the biggest female customer bases in the country, launched a special Women’s Day bot and sticker pack.

To continuously provide its users with topnotch service and enhance their app experience, Viber in 2020 also introduced new features such as My Notes that enabled users to sync their to-do lists and media across all their devices, Birthday Reminders that help users know who among their contacts are celebrating their special day, Disappearing Messages that allows people to set a limit to the lifespan of sensitive texts, and GIF Creator that brings out every user’s creativity.

As a response to COVID-19 pandemic that forced people to increase their online interactions, Viber last year also bolstered its capacities and doubled the maximum number of participants to 20 people at once in Group Video and Audio Calls. The app also entered into key partnerships that provided users life-saving information about COVID-19.