Meta AI Quietly Launches In Kenya — Finally!

So this only just happened… Meta AI is finally live in Kenya! I found out today, and for me, this is massive news — especially considering it launched in other African markets like Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi way back in April 2024. That’s well over a year ago! As of May 2025, Meta AI has over 1Billion users.

It’s honestly a bit perplexing. Kenya is one of Meta’s largest markets in Africa. Facebook alone has around 18 million users here, and WhatsApp must have at least 25 million. When you add Instagram to the mix, we’re likely talking over 35 million active users in Kenya across Meta’s platforms. That’s a huge footprint by any measure, so why the delay?

Also odd is how quietly Meta rolled this out. No fanfare. No announcements. Just… there it is. Live. Quietly accessible on the web at www.meta.ai.

So, what’s the big deal?

Meta AI is a generative AI assistant that now works across WhatsApp, Messenger, Facebook, and Instagram, plus a standalone web version. It’s totally free to use, which is big in a market like Kenya. You can use it to ask questions, have conversations, generate images from prompts, and more. It’s also accessible directly via the apps — like on WhatsApp, you can simply type “@Meta AI” in a chat to get started.

Now, having just started using it, I have to say — it still has a long way to go, especially when you compare it with more capable generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, DeepSeek, or even Perplexity. From what I’ve seen so far, the primary use case is image generation and light conversation.

However, there’s one more thing. Meta has incredible data-based insights on all its users across its massively popular platforms. On this basis, given that it can aggregate all these insights to build an incrediblely accurate profile of each user it can actually create one of the most personalized AI user experiences going forward.

But, that being said, Meta AI is free and with the reach Meta has in Kenya — especially on WhatsApp — this could be a game-changer in making generative AI more accessible to everyday users across the country.