Launch The name for Zalo is a
portmanteau of
Zing (an online website managed by
VNG) and
alo (a standard phrase used to answer a call in Vietnam). Zalo was created by Vương Quang Khải, the executive Vice President of VNG. After studying in the United States, he returned to Vietnam in 2007. Recently, he began to work primarily on
Artificial Intelligence technology, developing
Kiki, an AI-based
virtual assistant. The first
software test version of Zalo was released in August 2012, eight months after development began in late 2011. By September 2012, Zalo had released new versions on iOS, Android and the
Nokia S40. However, Zalo received little recognition due to various user issues, including having to use
Zing ID for login and utilizing
web platforms for the mobile application. In December 2012, the official version for Zalo was released to the public. On 8 January 2013, Zalo reached the top spot on the
App Store in Vietnam, passing their main competitor,
WeChat. In March 2013, Zalo reached its 1 million user milestone and quickly grew, having over 2 million users only two months later, surpassing all international competitors, including
Viber and
Line.
Usage Zalo has been continuously adding new features, such as
short videos, enhanced privacy features and other improvements to the software. In 2021, Zalo launched the
Zalo Connect feature to help citizens in
COVID-19-affected areas connect and support each other. In May 2022, Zalo added experimental
end-to-end encryption that utilizes the
Signal protocol. As of version 25.01.01, this feature is no longer available. Since 2022, Zalo began to introduce a series of artificial intelligence features, including
eKYC in 2022;
text-to-speech,
voice-to-text,
Zalo AI Avatar in 2023; voice dictation and
zSticker AI in 2024. == Main features ==