'Mxit chose to be stubborn'
Johannesburg - Fin24 users have expressed their views on mobile social network Mxit's dramatic decline.
Last week, Fin24 reported that the number of monthly active users on Mxit has fallen from 4.9 million in 2014 to 2.7 million in 2015.
READ: Dramatic decline in Mxit's user base
The data comes from World Wide Worx and Fuseware's SA Social Media Landscape 2016 report.
According to the study, Mxit's monthly active user base pales in comparison to the 13 million South Africans now on Facebook. Mxit is also down from its own previously recorded peak of around 7 million monthly active users in 2013.
Mxit was not willing to comment on the SA Social Media Landscape report but the company did point Fin24 to a statement released in March which said that users of the service are still highly engaged.
Mxit has also outlined plans to focus more on social services.
In the meantime, several Fin24 users have reflected on Mxit.
Fin24 user Ashford wrote:
"I have not used Mxit since 2013. The platform became overloaded with unnecessary functions that it made it difficult to navigate through the platform. Instead of fast tracking development on the platform to beat competition, Mxit chose to be stubborn and it has paid a heavy price for that."
Fin24 user Christien wrote:
"I deleted Mxit in 2010 already! Over rated! Was a good app back in the day when that was the only app to use! Still started with mxit 3.0 hahahahaha!!"
Fin24 user Corus said Mxit risks becoming extinct:
"The Editor,
I find it very obsolete... . I think they lost their opportunity to WeChat. It makes no sense to have both WeChat and Mxit on the same device, let alone both account for one individual.
For light chatting, WhatsApp is doing a good job, and for deep interaction with both friends and corporations, one can't look further away from WeChat, in fact, it's only a matter of time WeChat overtakes WhatsApp in the number of unique users since anything that one can do on WhatsApp, WeChat can do better and more."
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