Facebook Messenger for macOS Starts Rolling Out

BY Asif Shaik

Published 4 Mar 2020

Hot on the heels of the launch of a completely redesigned version of Facebook Messenger for iOS, the social media giant seems to have taken the opportunity to finally release the much-awaited Facebook Messenger app for macOS. The rollout is limited to France right now.

The Facebook Messenger app was announced for macOS last year, and a lot of Mac users were waiting for its release. The app was meant to be released by the end of 2019, but that didn’t happen. Now, the instant messaging app from Facebook seems to have made it to the Mac App Store. However, it is available only in France right now.

The folks over at MacGeneration first spotted the app on the Mac App Store. The social media firm could be testing its stability with a limited rollout and then release it globally in a few days. The company offers a web version of its IM service via the messenger.com website. However, the desktop version offers faster loading times and faster performance than the web version of the messaging service.

The desktop version of Facebook Messenger is built using Electron rather than using Apple’s Catalyst platform. This decision could have been taken so that the app runs without any issues on macOS versions earlier than macOS 10.15 Catalina.

As it can be seen in the screenshots below, the macOS version of Facebook Messenger comes with all the features that are seen on iOS and iPadOS versions, including conversation threads, emojis, message reactions, voice calls, video calls, search, stickers, Light and Dark themes, and more.

The app supports integration with macOS Catalina’s Dark Mode, so it can change its appearance as per the computers currently active UI theme. Other features of the app seem to include various forms of attachments, read receipts, and more.

If you’re anywhere in the world apart from France, you won’t be able to install the Facebook Messenger app for macOS right now, but we think that it will be released globally over the next few days.

Are you eagerly waiting for the Facebook Messenger app for macOS? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.

[Via MacGeneration]