UPDATED 22:37 EDT / JULY 22 2018

APPS

Snap to close down Snapcash as Snapchat continues to decline in popularity

Snap Inc.’s efforts to take a slice of the peer-to-peer mobile payments market has failed.

The Snapchat app maker said Sunday that it will close down its little-used Snapcash feature Aug. 30. Announced back in 2014, Snapcash was pitched as a way to allow friends to send each other money instantly by simply entering a cash amount into the subject line of a chat and pressing send.

Users were required to register their debit card for fund withdrawals and deposits, and if the people to whom they were sending money had not signed up for the service, they were required to do so within 24 hours or the funds would be returned to the sender.

Although the idea sounded reasonable, in reality it only became mildly popular as a way for Snapchat users to pay and tip adult performers on the platform. That wasn’t a great look for a company and app primarily popular with younger users, according to TechCrunch, which broke the story Sunday.

Snap confirmed the story, saying in a statement that “Yes, we’re discontinuing the Snapcash feature as of August 30, 2018. Snapcash was our first product created in partnership with another company – Square. We’re thankful for all the Snapchatters who used Snapcash for the last four years and for Square’s partnership!.”

The prevalence of porn payments may have been a motivating factor in Snap’s decision to close down Snapcash, but it’s also representative of a company that is in decline as its main competitor, the Facebook Inc.-owned Instagram, now dominates among millennials.

The Snapchat train has been in long-term decline and the company hasn’t done itself any favors along the way. With growth having essentially stalled at the beginning of the year, Snap announced a major redesign that precipitously prompted a switch to Instagram for users, the number of which had topped out at 191 million in the first quarter. Instagram, by comparison, recently passed 1 billion users.

Photo: Justraveling/Wikimedia Commons

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