BlackBerry has released BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) for Android Gingerbread devices as promised, which can be downloaded from the Google Play store or the BBM website.
The company earlier teased that it was working on the Gingerbread version of BBM for Android and will make it available for the devices powered by Android Gingerbread 2.3 as it accounts for more than 20 percent of the active Android devices around the world.
“Back in January we told you we were busy cooking up a special release of BBM for Android Gingerbread. Now, we’re pleased to share that it’s ready and will be available starting today,” wrote Jeff Gadway, Head of product and brand marketing of BBM, in the blog post.
“With 21 per cent of the global Android user base running on Gingerbread, we’re excited to welcome lots of new users in to the BBM community.”
According to the Google’s most recent distribution numbers of the Android platform, Gingerbread version (2.3.3 – 2.3.7) claims the second largest group of users with 20 percent, right after Android Jelly Bean version (4.1 – 4.3) with 60.7 percent.
BBM for iOS and Android reported more than 80 million active users at the end of October last year with around 20 million downloads in the launch week itself.
The Android version of the messaging app, since its launch, was compatible with smartphones that run on Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich version and higher. The company is opening up this messaging app to a significant number of Android users, with this additional support for the Gingerbread hardware.
