A billion now use Whatsapp, Gmail

• WhatsApp have more than doubled since Facebook bought the service for $19 billion in 2014, according to Zuckerberg

Facebook-owned smartphone messaging service WhatsApp has hit the billion-user mark, according to the leading social network's chief and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg.

"One billion people now use WhatsApp," Zuckerberg said in a post on his Facebook page. "There are only a few services that connect more than a billion people."

Google's free email service, Gmail, is the latest of the Internet giant's offerings to crest the bil-lion-user mark, chief Sundar Pi-chai said during an earnings call.

The ranks of people using WhatsApp have more than doubled since Facebook bought the service for $19 billion in 2014, according to Zuckerberg