14 DAY TRIAL // It looks like BlackBerry is almost ready for the big release of its most successful service for end-users BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) on Windows Phone platform.
The company confirmed several months ago the application, along with its instant messaging services will be available for Windows Phone users sometime in July/August.
True to its promise, BlackBerry launched the BBM application on Windows Phone Store a few hours ago, but the bad news is this is still a beta version.
In fact, BBM for Windows Phone is now in private beta, which means only a handful of users can now download and take advantage of the applications features.
According to the listing on Windows Phone Store, this would be BBM version 1.0.0.1 beta and the fact that it's still in beta is also confirmed in the app's description:
“BBM for Windows beta. We're getting ready to welcome Windows Phone users to the BBM community. BBM brings you together in the moment with friends and family through instant chats, voice calls, picture sharing, voice notes and more.”
Keep in mind that while this application is genuine, it's not available for the masses yet, but BlackBerry is expected to offer more details on BBM availability in the next couple of days.
It's unclear when exactly BBM for Windows Phone will be available for everyone, but the launch of the application should fill in a large spot left by WhatsApp Messenger which isn't working that well on Windows Phone 8.1 devices and rarely gets important updates.
There are lots of Windows Phone users who turned to other instant messaging solution the moment WhatsApp Messenger has been pulled from the Store, which means there's still a market for BBM.
Obviously, it would have been great if BlackBerry would have launched BBM on Windows Phone platform around the same time WhatsApp was missing, but this was something unexpected and the Canadian company did not seem to be ready for the move.
Anyway, even if BBM for Windows Phone will not be available for download for everyone in the next few days, we are certain BlackBerry will extend the beta program to a lot more Windows Phone users in the not so distant future.
We are expecting BlackBerry's official announcement regarding the release of the beta version of BBM where the company should share more details on how will it handle the private beta. Stay tuned for more updates on the matter.