14 DAY TRIAL // Instagram is surely one of the most popular applications out there, either on Android and iOS. New information seems to confirm just that, as Instagram became the 19th application in the Play Store to hit the 1 billion mark.
Instagram has just hit the 1 billion mark in Google's Play store, although estimates place the number of accounts at about 500 million. This would mean that the downloads counter doesn't actually differentiate between unique installs or not.
Nevertheless, Instagram has joined the exclusive ranks of big applications like Facebook app, WhatsApp, YouTube, Messenger and more. It's quite impressive that Facebook owns the two biggest social networks in the world and that at least 4 Facebook-owned apps have hit the 1 billion mark out of 19.
This gives us an idea of the influence that Facebook has all over the world. The first application to hit the 1 billion mark was Gmail, followed by Google Maps, YouTube and Facebook app.
Instagram was launched in 2010 on iOS and arrived to Android soon after. Facebook bought the service back in 2012 and the application grew even faster under Facebook's patronage. Recently, Instagram introduced some features that resembled those found inside Snapchat and it's safe to say that they've contributed to its increasing popularity, at least when it comes to the Android app.
It would be interesting to see which app will be the next one to reach the 1 billion mark, as there are many candidates for the position, including Twitter, Pinterest and most likely, Snapchat.