Facebook Lite will fix connectivity issue that 2G users faced: Product head

“We understood that connectivity was one of the main pain points for users in India along with the fact that users here were accessing the app from really low-end devices too,” says Vijay Shankar, Head of Products at Facebook Lite. He says the original Facebook is a complex “beast of an app” that can’t really perform well on devices that have low processing power, RAM and storage.

“That is when we decided to work on a new app from the ground up to get over these challenges and barriers to offer a good experience for these users,” he says, adding that his team started working on the app about nine months ago with ground testing starting this January.

“It was a big decision on our part to do a lite app as it would mean maining two different apps,” Shankar said, adding that so far the response has been positive showing there was clearly a demand for something like this. The app is now live in Google Play stores in a bunch of South East Asian and African countries.

Despite being a much lighter version that loads without lag on 2G networks, Facebook Lite will offer almost all the services of the full app. Only video and location service have been stripped of the app, as Shankar said they were still working on perfecting these experiences. On the other hand, the Messenger has been integrated into the app. Users will be able to run both apps on the same device if needed. “Most people wouldn’t miss a thing,” he said.

“We are filling up a hole that existed in the market, but we are not forcing anyone to adopt the new app. Facebook is just offering them a choice now,” he said.