Facebook to Retire its Messenger.com Web App in April

Facebook is planning to retire its Messenger.com web app in April after pulling the plug on its desktop apps for Windows and macOS a couple of weeks ago. In a support page spotted by French website Numerama, the company is inviting users to switch to its main Facebook website, which also offers a dedicated messaging page on facebook.com/messages.

“After messenger.com goes away, you will be automatically redirected to use facebook.com/messages for messaging on a computer. You can continue your conversations there or on the Messenger mobile app. If you currently use Messenger without a Facebook account, you can continue your conversations on the Messenger mobile app,” the company explained.

To be clear, the upcoming retirement of the Messenger.com web app will mostly affect people in the European Economic Area (EEA) who can use Messenger without a Facebook account. Soon, these users will only be able to use the Messenger mobile app to communicate.

If you’re in the EEA, using Messenger without a Facebook account can make sense if you want to communicate with other Facebook users in a more private way. Conversations on Messenger are still end-to-end encrypted, and users in the EEA can create Messenger accounts using just an email address without giving their phone number. However, social features like channels, Community Chats, and Stories don’t work when using Messenger without a Facebook account.

Facebook Messenger has billions of users, but so does WhatsApp, another Meta-owned messaging app that also supports end-to-end encryption. WhatsApp also offers pretty solid desktop apps and a web app, which recently added support for voice and video calls.