Picture messaging platform Snapchat has recently shared its second quarter results, and has revealed that the company has seen significant growth over the last three months that have seen the app surpass another milestone in terms of user numbers.
In 2019 alone, the company saw an 8% growth from Q1 to Q2, which equates to the platform gaining 13 million more daily active users. This now means that over 200 million people are using the app on a daily basis. This growth sent shares in the company soaring during after-hours trading, and is significantly more than what analysts forecast for the company, with predictions expecting an increase of two million users.
The company has given its reasons why it believes it has seen such an increase in the last three months, attributing the growth to an increase in popularity in terms of the app’s famous face filters. These are augmented reality lenses that users can play around with to alter their appearance and voice in a jovial manner. One of the most popular lenses in recent times has been the gender swap filters.
Snapchat has estimated that somewhere between seven and nine million users joined the network during the last quarter because of these filters, while a further four to six million joined because of the introduction of other new features to the app, making the total Snapchat user base hit the 203 million user mark.
The company also attributed this major growth to a redesign of the Android version of the app and an expansion into a number of new markets. Evan Spiegel, Snapchat’s CEO, said that growth in engagement and revenue is a result of a number of transitions the company made in the past year and a half, and hopes to be able to build on this momentum and make more significant progress in these areas in the coming months.
It is not just user numbers that have been good for the company in Q2. Revenue increased by a staggering 48% during the second quarter of 2019 in comparison to the same period of last year. Revenue this year totalled $388m (£311m). This level of revenue is more than what the company had predicted based on its Q1 earnings, which was between $335m (£268m) and $360m (£288m). This would have been a growth of between 28% and 37%, and would also have been a record earnings total.
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