Reviews for KakaoTalk : Messenger

The app is a messaging app that somehow manages to be worse than a run of the mill app, the app is outshined by relevant competition(especially western ones) and outside of Korea, where the app's main demographic is from, there's just no reason to use this over other messaging apps and even if you are from Korea simply switching messaging apps would make life so much more convenient

It was the best app ever..but not anymore! Please bring the old kakaotalk back..I don't want my kakaotalk to look like Instagram ..I don't want any likes either..and if so..at least make it optional to turn off the like button as you did with the comments ! Also make an option for people to choose if they want their profile pictures to look like Instagram grid ! I really don't need another Instagram in my life!!

The new update is really frustrating. It suddenly shows my friends’ photos on the front page without any permission, even ones that aren’t their current profile pics. That makes me worry my own old photos might be showing up too. I can’t find any option to delete past photos or choose only the ones I want to share. For people like me who also use KakaoTalk for work, this feels uncomfortable since my photos could be exposed to acquaintances I’m not close with. This should definitely be

Instead of continuing to work on providing a simple messaging app that everyone wants to use, the developers clearly wish they worked for Instagram instead. The recent update highlights the 'social' function of the app and blasts you with photos of people as soon as you open it. It also hides the friends list behind this weird social media mode.

It getting worse by time.. Can't make a new account with a new phone number because of the new way of verification which is making me sending SMS and pay money for this SMS and then nothing happened to this verification even waiting for hrs on the app to check, and in the end I got an error!!! .. That happened twice with me but for sure I won't pay more fees for SMS to get just an error.. And no other ways to sign up!!! That's the worst thing..

The app is close to unusable since the latest release (Oct. 2025). Messages are incredibly delayed for everyone in our family, we unfortunately had to fall back to other messaging services. While I'm at it, there is still the recurring issue of foreign users being tagged as unverified users if they do not have a Korean phone number. I think this really works against the popularity of the app, to gatekeep its feature set in such a manner

Worst customer service ever. They write these long emails and give vague statements like it will be difficult to help you. Unfortunately if your account is deactivated, your contacts cannot be recovered. That is so easy and clear. Then they said contact them again if I need help in future. I've lost all my contacts and can't add them again. Your app is useless to me now. It's okay they couldn't help. It's not okay their messaging is so unclear and unhelpful

I've been using Kakao for more than a decade and it has only gotten more and more annoying to use. Most of the time I have problems sending messages and have to resend them multiple times until they finally go through, calls often go undetected from no notification. Kakao has made many changes to the apps but when it comes down to it, I use this app for sending messages and calling. If I can't even send a message reliably the first time, it seriously deters me from using it further. Sorry.

got a message that if i don't access my account it would be deleted for inactivity. I tried accessing my account and i'm unable to login. I went onto their website login and was able to get in no problem. Reset my password, again, no issues on the web version. Tried again on mobile after deleting cache, storage and force stopping the app. nada. keeps telling me to check my account and password. So... not sure what's wrong with their servers.. but definitely not something to keep me around.

Terrible. I finally had use for it to communicate with my fellow interns. First, it wouldn't let me open chats and took forever before I was suddenly allowed in. Always recieved a message about user policy. Then, I tried to access another chat that it yet again wouldn't let me in, so I uninstalled to reinstall and see if that's the issue. Suddenly, my account was temporarily disabled, so I attempted to create another account, now my phone number suddenly doesn't work. A fellow intern had issues.

I'm rating Kakao for my PC computer using Windows 11, but this isn't giving me that option. I've had to uninstall Kakao multiple times because it's so glitchy and dysfunctional. It often doesn't work at all with video calls. Now one of my chats is showing in a nearly invisible window. I've tried closing and re-opening the app, but the problem persists. To add more frustration to my experience with Kakao, they make it impossible to uninstall it! What a nightmare!

I would've given this a five until their recent update. I never get notifications from my friends when they send me messages, and yes I checked the settings. Still did nothing. I tried emailing them, didnt work. If you're going to put an email up, at least set it up. This app has been slowly getting worse and worse. Might be time to uninstall it unless they fix everything.

This app could really use some better storage options. It should at least be able to be moved to the SD card. I use the app for work and it's now taking up 5+ GB. Space is really becoming an issue. It wouldn't be so bad if the app could be moved to the SD card. Also, the way you add contacts is way too complex. You have to scan a barcode? Half the time I really need to think about how to find the barcode. Why can't you just search for a contact and add them like normal?

In general, the app is good. Especially I like the feature to be able to send the links to my own account for future reading/watching. However, the voice call doesn't ring at all. I miss "all" calls because of this. I tested it several times but even when the app is open and I'm staring at it, it's a hit or miss. Something is wrong. Hope it's fixed soon. Therefore only two stars.

This was my app that I lived by to keep with my friends in Korea. Lately this thing is a mess. I don't hear the ring tones, the video constantly freezes, and I keep getting " this feature is unavailable right now." Before any say it's due to internet connection, I have tried to use my phone data and turned of Wi-Fi so there is no excuse!!! This problem needs to be addressed immediately because this has been going on for a month and a half.

Easy to use, free chat and video calling and more. Responsive customer service when needed. Only glitch is it's non-English speaking company (Korean) so there are a few bumps here and there. Also transferring your service to a new phone is complicated, especially if you get a new number, too (you lose photos, videos--even more if not very careful). On the other hand, it offers nice emoji and can be downloaded and used by everyone including people who have nothing to do with Korea.

they recently added ads as banners. The problem is the ads come a second after it loads and it's easily clickable because it loads as you click on the first chat. it's very annoying. also, they store huge amounts of data on your phone that should be temporary and deleted after a period of time but it stays on permanently. so if you're someone with a lot of video files and pictures, then the app size will only get bigger and bigger because it stores that data on your phone.

Same as others, I was restricted as soon as I signed up. Contacted them about it, and they responded. Unfortunately, they just responded with the rules for why one would be restricted, like I hadn't read it already. Like, all I did was literally just sign up. By the looks of things, clearly this isn't a friendly app for peeps with international numbers (i.e. not from korea).

This app has fallen to a similar trap like so many others where the UI/UX takes a back seat to ads. The newest update pushes an intrusive ad at the top of the chats list window. It's annoying but is made worse by the fact that it loads half a second later than everything else, making the chat rooms "jump" down. This occurs regardless of the speed of the internet connection (Wi-Fi vs mobile data), leading to misclicking on the ad, inflating engagement stats. Do better Kakao Corp, do better.

A dependable messenger, but with the recent update to include ads, it's become a more frustrating experience. Especially the ad that populates on the top of the list of chats. It appears a second late, which often makes you click on it instead of the first unread chat messenger. This is obviously intended to encourage unintended clicks. Not a service that has the best interest of users in mind.