BlackBerry Announces BBM is Coming to Andriod on the 21st & iOS on September 22nd

That’s right BBM fans — the iconic mobile social network will begin rolling out for Android and iPhone customers around the world from September 21. Soon, you’ll be able to easily connect with friends on different platforms. As you may know BBM was previously exclusive to BlackBerry smartphones, and it will be available as a free download in Google Play and the App Store.

 

BBM for Android and iPhone features:
● BBM Chat – Enjoy real, immediate conversations with friends on Android, iPhone and BlackBerry smartphones. Not only does BBM let you know that your message has been delivered and read, it also shows you that your friend is responding to the message.

● More than chat – With BBM you can share files on your phone such as photos and voice notes, all in an instant.

● Keep your group in the loop – Multi-person chats are a great way to invite contacts to chat together. BBM Groups lets you invite up to 30 friends to chat together, and go a step further than multi-chat by sharing photos and schedules. And, with Broadcast Message, you can send a message out to all your BBM contacts at once.

● Post Updates and stay in the know – BBM lets you post a personal message, profile picture and your current status, and lets your contacts know instantly in Updates.

● Your unique PIN – Every BBM user has a unique PIN that maintains your privacy, so you don’t have to give out your phone number or email address to a new or casual contact.

Availability:
BBM will be available as a free download for Android smartphones running Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean (Android 4.x) beginning at 7AM EDT on September 21. BBM for iPhones running iOS 6 and iOS 7 will become available for each market on the App Store schedule of 12:01 AM local time on September 22. For more information, or to download BBM for Android or iPhone, visit www.BBM.com.

The company has also announced a BBM Channels feature which will launch later this year. 

BBM Channels will provide a forum for active, real conversations between you and the people, brands, celebrities, artists, service providers, communities and more, that matter to you. By creating a Channel, individuals and brands can engage their friends and communities in conversations sparked by their thoughts, ideas and passions. Subscribing to a Channel will let you join conversations with people who share your interests. In addition, BBM Video calling and BBM Voice calling are planned for availability for Android and iPhone in a future version.

BlackBerry Messenger for Android leaks in APK form, doesn't ping yet!

BlackBerry’s BBM messaging platform has leaked for Android today on the XDA Developers forums. The app itself, while functioning, is pretty much useless as it fails to register with BBM servers and thus still doesn’t do anything.

The app is reported to currently be able of running only on whitelisted devices, which we presume are dev units inside the BlackBerry HQ.
In its initial version, the BBM application for Android and iOS will only support BBM chats, multi-person chats, voice note sharing, and BlackBerry Groups. The latter will allow BBM users to set up groups to share calendar, photos, files, etc.
To refresh your memory, a month ago, the BBM app for Android was in its beta testing stages and then we got to see some leaked screenshots of the apps interface. If the latest promises from company officials are anything to go by, we should expect the full version of the app to hit both the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store by the end of this month.
Despite the app not being usable at this point, you can enjoy the login and user registration screens by following the source link below and downloading the .APK file.

Source | Via