LINE App

Description

LINE began as a crisis response. The March 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami knocked out Japan’s phone networks, and NHN Japan engineers were unable to contact their families. The company developed a crude internet-based messaging application for internal use, and by June 23, 2011, it had publicly released that application on Android and iOS. Within eighteen months, LINE had crossed 100 million registered users — a growth rate few consumer apps had matched at that point.

The application includes messaging, free voice and video calling, a social timeline, a digital wallet, games, news and a business communications platform all in one installation. LINE Corporation, which split from NHN Japan and later merged with the parent of Yahoo Japan to form LY Corporation in 2023, operates the platform mainly in Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, and Indonesia — places where Line is a fundamental part of the infrastructure and not one of many options.

ORIGINS AND GROWTH

The origin story of earthquakes influenced the early product decisions made by LINE. NHN Japan had a focus on stability and low data usage as the engineers had witnessed a modern communications network collapsing under load. The early application was done with minimal bandwidth, which was important in markets where the cost of data remained high throughout the early 2010s.

LINE developed the product far beyond messaging almost immediately. Stickers — large illustrated characters used to express emotions — launched in October 2011 and became both a defining feature and the company’s first monetization model. LINE opened a Sticker Shop where creators could sell their original designs and share the revenue with the platform, transforming sticker purchases into marketplace. By 2014, hundreds of millions of dollars were generated each year by selling the stickers.

The platform introduced a mobile payment service, called LINE Pay, in 2014. LINE Games followed, which integrated casual games right into the app with social leaderboards. LINE Today introduced a curated news feed. LINE OpenChat developed public interest-based group channels apart from private messaging. Each addition kept users within the confines of the LINE ecosystem for tasks they might otherwise be doing in separate applications.

The merger that created LY Corporation in 2023 placed the services of both LINE and Yahoo Japan under joint ownership, although the former remained a separate service with its own application and branding.

KEY FEATURES

Messaging

LINE’s messaging system supports text, voice messages, photos, videos, documents and contact sharing. Group chats contain up to 500 people. Keep — a personal notes and saved content feature — stores messages, images and files within LINE for later reference. Message recall allows a sender to remove a message from the recipient’s view within 24 hours after it is sent.

Free Calls

Voice and video calls between users of the Line app use internet data instead of cellular minutes. Group video calls have a maximum of 200 participants per call. Call quality adjusts to available network conditions. LINE Out offers paid calls from LINE to traditional phone numbers in countries outside the home market of the user.

Timeline and Social Features

The Timeline tab shows status updates, photos, and videos that have been posted by contacts on the Line app, and is a lightweight social feed. Users can respond to posts, comment, and post to their own Timeline. Story posts — which are visible for 24 hours — are similar to the format created by Instagram and Snapchat.

Stickers and Themes

The LINE Sticker Shop sells character sticker sets from official LINE characters such as Brown, Cony, and Sally, as well as creator-made designs. Premium sticker packs come to life. Themes alter the whole application’s colour scheme, background, and visual style. Line STORE sells themes and sticker sets both in the mobile app and a web storefront.

LINE Pay

LINE Pay is used to store payment card information and to make in-app purchases, merchant payments at participating retailers, and peer-to-peer money transfers between Line contacts. Availability and supported features vary by country, with Japan and Taiwan having the most complete implementations.

Official Accounts

Businesses, public figures, and organizations use Official Accounts to communicate with followers at scale. Users follow an Official Account in the same way that they would follow a contact and the account can send messages to all followers at the same time. Retailers use Official Accounts for promotions, customer support and order notification.