A LOT. Even in developing countries people paid ₹50 (or the equivalent of a $1). WhatsApp changes this model a bit by partnering with carriers. Unfortunately my memory is not clear on whether that was before or after the acquisition.

Edit: Note: WhatsApp publicly claimed that a billion users paying $1 each is enough for them. Also remember, a lot of the technical complexity, infrastructure requirement and data storage requirements went away in their model of being just a conduit. They had no interest in reading, parsing, mining, storing or monetizing the messages. This let them run it with a lean crew.

Wasn't there a point where WhatsApp cost $1/year or something like that? Or am I thinking of something else? I don't know how long that lasted though.

That was technically their business model, but they gave you one year free and also extended your 'subscription' indefinitely if you decided not to pay after that - basically the WinRAR of messaging apps.

On iOS the app used to be $0.99 (one-off), which probably made them a couple millions. In 2013 they moved to a subscription model [1] but this was never implemented; I think nobody was ever charged.

[1] https://www.wired.co.uk/article/whatsapp-on-ios-now-free

I was an idiot who paid for it. twice (－‸ლ)

I paid for it too. I like to think that "idiots" like us prove that there is demand for a paid ad-and-tracking-free messaging service, so maybe our efforts weren't in vain.

If you live in a wealthy country, you probably "lost" more money writing that comment than what you paid for WhatsApp, even paying twice.

Completely unrelated from anything. People don't come on HN to make or save money.

Until the facebook acquisition it cost about $1/year. IIRC it was even profitable.