In The Netherlands (and most of Europe probably) for normies Whatsapp is definitely number 1, although most people will simultaneously use Facebook/messenger. Within businesses Microsoft Teams is starting to get popular, whereas Zoom seems to be more of US thing.
Wealthier "normie Apple families" use IMessage, but they'll always have a Whatsapp account on the side to talk to "the others".
Dutch nerds/early adopters will sometimes use Signal, but it's definitely not a thing most people know about. Telegram is even rarer in my experience.
French government uses Matrix/Riot.im
There are exceptions to the above though. I don't use Whatsapp or IMessage at all and never used it for more than a few days total in my entire life. My main messaging app is Signal and I'm totally fine. Got about 50 contacts on there and that's more then enough :D
Nightmare scenario for me: Google successfully integrates whatever there newest messaging brand is into the Android messages SMS client (now rebranded to Google messages) and all Android users switch to that because it's default. Result: Google messages becomes IMessage for Android, including the vendor lock-in with added tracking as a bonus. I feel this is happening.
Wealthier "normie Apple families" use IMessage, but they'll always have a Whatsapp account on the side to talk to "the others".
Dutch nerds/early adopters will sometimes use Signal, but it's definitely not a thing most people know about. Telegram is even rarer in my experience.
French government uses Matrix/Riot.im
There are exceptions to the above though. I don't use Whatsapp or IMessage at all and never used it for more than a few days total in my entire life. My main messaging app is Signal and I'm totally fine. Got about 50 contacts on there and that's more then enough :D
Nightmare scenario for me: Google successfully integrates whatever there newest messaging brand is into the Android messages SMS client (now rebranded to Google messages) and all Android users switch to that because it's default. Result: Google messages becomes IMessage for Android, including the vendor lock-in with added tracking as a bonus. I feel this is happening.