Comment by throwaway6250 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by throwaway6250 | Hacker News Reader

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People seem to have the idea that WeChat is some sort of amazing application -- it's not. In fact the only reason why it has the market share it does in China is simply because all competitors are blocked.

Some of WeChat's real pain points are: - No backing up your messages to the cloud like WhatsApp or having them loaded from the server like Facebook Messenger. Moving all your messages from one phone to another is quite the ordeal .

- Complete disregard for platform standards. Specifically notifications on Android and Windows 10 are atrocious. Both WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger have notifications that are well integrated with the especially the Android notification system, WeChat notifications however are not.

-A lot of nice to have chat features are either non existent or have just recently been introduced. For example a poor implementation of quoting a previous message was just introduced like a month ago, and there are no reactions for specific messages -- and no timeline for implementing them either.

WeChat does have quite a bit of different "apps" built into it, but not really more convenient to use than the separate apps are. It's mainly just a casualty of China's lack of anti monopoly legislation.On my phone I have Alipay (the other half of china's online payment duopoly) installed together with WeChat, and almost always use it for payment (It's pretty much accepted everywhere WeChat is)

>No backing up your messages to the cloud like WhatsApp or having them loaded from the server like Facebook Messenger.

Their old product QQ has it, the reason they didn't do it on WeChat, I think it's because they have no other choice since:

-They have to make WeChat "presentable" internationally, they means they can't appear to store it since they are beholden to China.

-They need to convey a message that they aren't watching you, but in reality their system needs to be monitored by Chinese police real time[1], since that rules out the option of E2E encryption, the only way is at least appear to be hands off.

[1]https://advox.globalvoices.org/2017/12/27/dont-call-xi-the-b...

> simply because all competitors are blocked.

International competitors may be. Till this day, I didn't see something come close to what WeChat is offering in China.

WeChat is like Chrome, it is so big and ubiquitous in China, it can dictate standard.

The online backup of messages itself is a pain point I agree, but local transfer is possible, though a bit cumbersome.

I think the international opinion is that there is no WeChat competitor in China because people are afraid to step on the toes of those in power. Chrome is enormous and ubiquitous because maintaining a modern browser is orders of magnitude more difficult than maintaining a chat application.

Why do you think there a many competitors outside China but none in?

> I think the international opinion is that there is no WeChat competitor in China because people are afraid to step on the toes of those in power

But how can there isn't a WeChat competitor, that actually does all the things WeChat is capable of in US/EU?

Regarding WeChat as if it is another chat application only means you have never been a regular user of it, which is probably true to most HN folks.

WeChat actually has its own embedded WebView within it and JS execution engine also. It also has the whole Paypal counterpart ships with it. The whole WeChat ecosystem is probably on par with the whole Facebook, probably more complex than Chrome I would say.

> But how can there isn't a WeChat competitor, that actually does all the things WeChat is capable of in US/EU?

For many reasons, but I think a major one is because neither EU nor US (both people and governments) would be cool with all aspects of one's life being functional ONLY by using this one app. Imagine if a WeChat competitor came out in EU/US, and now you cannot use transit without this app at all, or buy things, or get a taxi, etc.

This is extremely anti-competitive and goes even beyond the usual monopoly definition. Major politicians these days run for president on the promise to break down Amazon, Google, etc. And neither of those come even close to the monopolistic reach on the scale that WeChat operates on.

What you are saying is to provide an explanation why WeChat-like apps didn't and probably are not going to happen outside of China, but it still means there is NO WeChat alternatives outside China.

The reason is not that important however.

The Chinese market is unique, Western economy can't create something like WeChat doesn't mean that its existence is something abnormal.

Chinese companies create something more to the liking of Chinese consumers should get anyone surprised. When it comes to internet, and no one is enjoying natural advantage.

I understand WeChat is more comparable to Google services (webview, payments, maps, social platform, chat) in terms of scope, but in America, Google gets challenged in specific areas and loses, like losing social to Facebook after many social media platform attempts.

Why doesn't WeChat get more competitors in just a specific area, like chat, which is a lot simpler, so a company could potentially do it better than WeChat?

WeChat doesn't get that kind of competition in China at all, and it really looks like its because of the government.

Some WeChat competitors in China: Chat: Fetion, Doushan, Mi Talk; Social: Soul, Momo; Payment: Alipay, Huawei Pay, UnionPay QuickPass

I don't think there are competitors outside of china for wechat. In messaging space yes, but that's only one aspect of why wechat is popular in china. I don't know of anything anywhere that has the functionality and integration with everyday life that wechat has in China.

Maybe most people only see the outside of china version of wechat, which is primarily just chat. Inside china that's not the case.

WeChat Mini Programs (integrations / built-in "apps") usually aren't as rich as the equivalent standalone iOS / Android apps, but they benefit from WeChat's distribution platform and network effect.

Everything shared on WeChat usually deeplinks to the equivalent Mini Program within WeChat. These apps receive organic traffic through social sharing and can also enhance this through advertising on WeChat.

I do not see Chinese consumers switch apps much other than switching to video / streaming apps like 抖音 (TikTok) and gaming apps.

I think you're missing the point and the reason for the appeal of wechat. In China it's much more than just a messaging platform, and reality is most people don't care about notification standards and such.

I've used wechat expensively in China and I wish there was something like that in the US. Wechat just makes it so much easier to do somethings and has a nice integration with life. Some examples outside of messaging:

- payments obvious, but also ability to send money, split bills etc.

- Orders things. Either in person at restaurants, delivery or a ride

- The social media aspect. A lot of events, tickets etc are sent via wechat.

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