For the Mac user who doesn't want to tie up a browser tab for Messenger, there is the Messenger for Mac app. It's not from Facebook but an open source project by self-proclaimed fans of Messenger. The messenger app is just a shortcut to messaging in Facebook website. Facebook allows users to download a copy of their Facebook data from the website. Follow below steps to backup Messenger chat history to PC and Mac computers.

When Facebook took the move to shift mobile chat solely to Messenger back in 2014, it angered a large percentage of its users. Now, half a decade later, we’ve had some time to acclimatize, with Messenger growing to 1.3 billion daily users. Now, it seems Facebook is about to shake things up again, with the social giant testing a move for messaging returning to the Facebook app.

First spotted by eagle-eyed app-delver, Jane Manchun Wong, the unreleased feature brings a limited version of chat back to the core app. The screenshots that Wong posted on Twitter show a familiar icon being added to the main Facebook app home screen, with the Messenger icon at the top right. That button doesn’t open Messenger in the test version, instead it opens a pared-down chat function inside the core app.

It seems that at this stage, only basic messaging functions like replies, GIFs, and the ubiquitous Thumbs-Up are available.

Anyone who relies on voice or video chat, or likes to send files or any of the dozens of other features that were added to Messenger will have to still use Messenger. Maybe Facebook will slowly add the more-used features back into the main Facebook app over time, although it needs to be careful to not let it get too bloated again.

If this test gets rolled out to all users, it would give me a reason to install the main Facebook app again. Like many, I don’t use Facebook much anymore partly due to privacy issues but also because most of my contacts are on other platforms. I do keep Messenger Lite on my phone to keep in touch with family, which lets me use messaging without interacting with most of the advertising and other Facebook features that I don’t care for.

Is this part of Facebook’s new push for unified messaging across all its apps? It could be, as Zuckerberg is looking to bring the same chat experience to all inboxes, so having the main Facebook app without messaging at all would have been weird.

What do you think? Would you like to see Messenger go back into Facebook’s main app? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

Editors’ Recommendations:

Communicating with friends, work colleagues, and teammates around the world has never been easier, thanks to smartphones and the huge range of options for sending and receiving messages instantly on your Mac.

Often, when you’re working, using a phone to send and receive messages isn’t convenient — it’s much easier use your Mac, especially if you want to share documents and images.

You could, of course, try and encourage everyone you communicate with to use the same platform, but given that some of them will be overseas and others working for companies who have their own policies, using multiple messaging clients is often a necessity.

Unreleased Messenger Mac App Download

That brings other problems, namely having to use multiple applications and use lots of login names and passwords. That also means having several windows open and generally cluttering up your screen.

Combine messaging apps you need

The solution is to use an aggregator for instant messaging apps — one app that brings them all together. IM+ is a good choice here. It allows you to connect up to 15 different messaging platforms, including Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter, Slack, WeChat, Instagram, and Google Hangouts.

All-in-one instant messenger

Get Setapp to take all your messengers to one app on Mac. A single spot for all communications.

IM+ can handle personal messages and chats. You only have to log in once and IM+ connects you automatically to all the accounts you have set up. It’s truly a universal messaging app for Mac. You can even set up multiple accounts on the same platform, such as personal and corporate Twitter, and access them all. And to make it easier to tell them apart, you can choose an accent color for each account when it’s displayed in the sidebar. Each messaging service appears in the sidebar using its native icon to make it easier to spot and, when you have a new message, a flag appears on the icon, just as it would in the native app.

If you want notifications for some services but not others, you can specify that in the settings when you add the account. And if you want to share files, you can do that too!

Putting all your messaging accounts in one app is a huge time saver and makes it much easier to keep track of conversations — you don’t have to remember to open each individual app. And if you use IM+ for Twitter, you can even use it to monitor your timeline and mentions, as well as your direct messages.

What about other universal messaging apps

There are no default alternatives to IM+ on your Mac, but you can of course find some from other developers, such as Franz, Rambox, and Trillian, all of which allow you to connect to multiple messaging accounts from one app. And if you’d prefer to work inside a browser, there’s All-in-One Messenger. However, if you require native speed, convenience, and polished look, nothing beats IM+ in our book.

Unreleased Messenger Mac App Installer

Moreover, IM+ is particularly suited for business use by supporting LinkedIn and Slack. And with the inclusion of WhatsApp and WeChat, the app has become a truly global messaging solution. Best of all, you can try IM+ for free with a 7-day trial from Setapp, along with over 150 high-quality Mac apps. Get productive today!

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Unreleased Messenger Mac App Mac

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