Slack Statistics to Annoy Your Colleagues With

Email is dead and Slack killed it. Or at least it certainly wanted to.

Slack (An almost-ironic acronym for “Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge”) is an instant messaging platform that launched back in 2013. It’s a pioneer in what we now call the team collaborative applications market.

Slack’s main aim is to improve efficiency in the workplace by streamlining communication between colleagues and teams. Like the many other similar applications that have appeared over the years, Slack is designed to replace emails with a much quicker and less-convoluted way of communicating in the workplace. Slack statistics show that this program, more so than many of its competitors, has gained immense popularity over the years. Indeed, Slack’s number of users reached 12 million this year. The platform is used by companies throughout the world, including more than half of Fortune 100 companies.

But even if they do communicate via Slack, many offices also use email and other collaborative applications. One could wonder how many applications we need to send senseless jokes to our colleagues?

And although it’s still a market darling and one of the fastest-growing startups in the world, Slack has faced a range of problems recently. The rise of a new challenger in the form of Microsoft Teams may have caught the reigning champion unprepared. Keep reading our Slack stats to see how this tool will fare in the fight for our hearts and keyboards.

Slack usage statistics

1. Slack is used by over 12 million people daily in 2019.

(Business Insider)

Slack has been struggling recently. Its stock prices have been falling since it went public and Microsoft Teams has surpassed Slack in user numbers. However, Slack might be down, but it’s definitely not out. In October, the company announced that the Slack user base had surpassed 12 million. Statistics on Slack show that this is a 37% jump from the previous year. The purpose of this announcement, among other things, was to show some kind of growth in the face of the aforementioned decline. It seems to have paid off, because Slack stocks rose by 2% following the statement.

2. The projected Slack revenue for 2019 is $390 million, and it’s expected to reach $4.22 billion in 2025.

(Statista)

While Slack’s stocks are plummeting, its revenue is nothing to scoff at. Data gathered by Statista shows an expected revenue of $390 million for 2019. Six years from now, Slack’s annual revenue is expected to reach a whopping $4.22 billion.

3. 85,000 paid organization users use Slack.

(Statista)

Statista’s data on how many companies use Slack should give you an idea of just how popular this platform is. Data from Statista’s research shows that 85,000 paid organization users are using Slack right now.

4. Companies with 10 to 50 employees and $1-10 million in revenue are most likely to use Slack.

(Enlyft)

When we look at what companies use Slack, we can see that Slack is mostly favored by smaller startups and companies, especially thanks to its free plan. According to Enlyft, the most-represented companies on Slack are those with 10-50 employees and with $1-10 million in revenue.

5. 91% of businesses use at least two messaging apps.

(Computer World)

Discussion about the workplace messaging app market has predominantly been focused on the battle between Slack and Microsoft Teams. This is, of course, to be expected - markets are inherently competitive and everyone wants to know who’s on top. However, what’s missing from most conversations is data showing that most businesses actually use at least two messaging apps. Research conducted by Mio shows that 91% of businesses use two or more messaging apps at the same time. Of all the companies surveyed, 66% use Slack and/or Microsoft Teams.

6. Over 1.5 billion messages are sent through Slack each month.

(Business Insider)

The latest Slack chat statistics concerning the number of messages that are sent monthly via the app come from 2016. During that year, Business Insider reported that over 1.5 billion messages were sent through Slack per month. By now this number is significantly higher, since over 12 million people now use the application.

7. 65 of Fortune 100 companies use Slack.

(Slack)

Slack wears this stat with pride. The main selling point for Slack is its usefulness as a workplace messaging and organizational app, so catering to 65% of the world’s 100 most-valuable companies could be considered the ultimate proof of its effectiveness. We don’t know whether these companies also use other messaging apps, but one of our previous stats suggests they probably do.

8. 90% of people using Slack are using the free version.

(TechCrunch)

Slack comes with one free package and three paid subscription plans. The free version comes with Slack’s basic features: searchable messages, two-factor authentication, and 10 apps and integrations. The Slack paid account plan is, as we mentioned, split into three separate offers. These plans start at $6.25 per month per user and provide more storage and better app integrations, among other features.

According to TechCrunch, the vast majority of Slack users rely on the free plan. These numbers come from when Slack had 10 million users, compared to how many people use slack now (12 million), but they should give us an idea of the split between paid and free users. Tech Crunch’s stats show that there were around 638,000 organizations using Slack. Out of that number, 88,000 are using one of Slack paid plans, while 550,000 were using the free version.

9 The number of companies that pay for Slack has risen by 50% between 2018 and 2019, rising to over 85,000 paid users.

(SlackHQ)

In January 2019, Slack reported a significant jump in the number of users that are subscribed to one of the company’s paid plans. This is pretty important, as a big chunk of revenue Slack generates comes through its paid subscriptions. According to the company’s own Slack team statistics from early 2019, the number of companies that use one of Slack’s paid subscriptions is now more than 85,000, up 50% from the previous year. This comes as much-needed good news for Slack, which is currently struggling against Microsoft Teams.

10. Slack is used in more than 150 countries.

(Japan Times)

Slack is by no means a US-only app. According to data provided on Slack’s website, the application has users in more than 150 countries worldwide. Furthermore, more than half of Slack daily active users are from outside the USA. The second-largest market for Slack after the US is Japan.

11. Microsoft Teams has overtaken Slack, reaching 13 million daily users.

(Forbes)

Slack’s main competitor in the booming collaborative apps market is Microsoft Teams. Hailing from the tech giant Microsoft, Teams was released in early 2017. At first, there was talk of Microsoft bidding $8 billion to buy out Slack, but Microsoft decided to focus on improving Skype for Business instead. Afterwards, the company designed its own team collaboration app.

At first, Microsoft Teams was reserved only for subscribers to Office 365, and therefore wasn’t a direct competitor to Slack, since most freelancers and small businesses preferred the free Slack option. However, during 2018, Microsoft created a free plan and witnessed a surge in popularity. In July this year, the company announced it had hit 13 million daily active users, surpassing Slack, which at the time of the announcement had 10 million daily users.

12. 6,318 companies use Slack in their tech stacks.

(Stackshare)

According to data provided by StackShare, 6,318 companies use Slack in their tech stacks. A tech stack is a set of technologies that an organization uses to build a mobile or web application. These companies include Airbnb, Pinterest, Dropbox, and Lyft. Furthermore, 20,414 developers on StackShare have said they use Slack.

13. Slack has banned accounts in five countries that are under US sanctions.

(Independent)

It’s evident that politics regularly spill out into business, while some even say that the two are inseparable, especially in the US. During 2018, Slack banned all accounts in the following five countries: Syria, North Korea, Iran, Cuba, and Crimea. Some US users complained that they do not live in nor do business with these countries or their residents, but still got their accounts banned as a result of spending their holidays in the sanctioned countries.

14. Users spend approximately 10 hours per day logged in on Slack.

(Time)

Slack is without a doubt a widely used and popular app. But does it end up boosting productivity, or can it actually impair it? While these Slack conversation statistics alone won’t answer that question, they are very telling. According to data provided in this 2015 article from Time, users spent an average of 10 hours per day logged into Slack. Of course, this does not mean that we spend all 10 of those hours actively using it. However, being online on the platform means we are open to receiving (and sending) messages, where some of them might not be work-related at all. With that in mind, it’s worth asking this important question: Are we actually spending too much time on Slack?

Slack productivity statistics

15. Using Slack reduces the number of emails by 32% and meetings by 23%.

(Slack)

One of the main purposes of applications such as Slack is to reduce the amount of time it takes to communicate between individual workers and/or teams, as well as to decrease email spam. According to Slack team stats provided by Slack itself, it manages to do just that. In the Business Value of Slack study, data shows that using Slack reduces the number of emails we send by 32% and time spent in meetings by 23%.

16. Sales teams that use Slack are 5% more likely to come out on top during business dealings.

(Slack)

According to this data, Slack not only improves collaboration between employees within a company, but boosts their general productivity, especially in sales. Research conducted by Slack into the changes in efficiency the application brings tells us that sales teams are 5% more likely to win deals if they’re using Slack. Furthermore, sales teams can expect up to a 25% increase in potential deals they win every year and a 0.2% increase in revenue.

17. According to Slack, the application boosts productivity by 32%.

(Slack)

Slack workspace statistics from 2015 show that the application’s users experience a boost in productivity up to 32%. This means that by using Slack, the amount of time users can devote to working and the amount of work they get done increases significantly. Of course, this data comes from Slack itself, so it should be taken with a pinch of salt.

18. In 2019, 10.4% of our workday screen time is spent on emails, while 5.2% is spent on messaging.

(Vox)

We spend 5.5 hours in front of our screens during an average workday. Vox reports that, of those 5.5 hours, 10.4% is spent on emails and 5.2% on messaging and chat. The rise of applications such as Slack has caused email usage to go down - from 13.6% in 2013 to 10.4% in 2019. Naturally, the time we spend on chat/messaging services has skyrocketed since then; these services only took up 1% of screen time in 2013. We still spend around 15% of our screen time on communication services, which isn’t necessarily good for productivity.

19. When Slack went down in June 2018, productivity rose by 5%.

(Rescue Time)

We’ve seen from the previous stats how Slack improves productivity across the board - from reducing email spam and meetings to boosting productivity and sales. This platform’s effectiveness is self-evident, especially when we look at how many users does Slack have. However, it seems Slack can also negatively affect our productivity. The reasons are pretty obvious - we end up spending too much time communicating through Slack and our work can suffer as a result. Slack went down on June 27, 2018. Rescue Time conducted research on productivity changes during that downtime and found that productivity actually rose by 5% when Slack was down.

20. 51% of Slack users use Google Docs and 28% rely on Dropbox.

(Survey Monkey)

According to Slack posting statistics, the two services most commonly used in tandem with Slack are Google Docs and Dropbox. Google Docs links are pasted into Slack by 51% of the messaging platform’s users, while 28% rely on Dropbox for online storage. However, Survey Monkey, the group that conducted this research, says this means Slack might create its own integrated replacements for these services.

21. In 2016, teams that turned to Slack saw a 48.6% reduction in emails.

(SlackHQ)

Email, the original business messaging technology, can be a chore to manage. Unnecessary emails and forwards fill up inboxes, and it can take a huge amount of time to sift through every message and separate the important content from the junk.

According to Slack, teams that deployed the software in 2016 said they saw a 48.6% decrease in emails, allowing them to spend more time actually working. When your employees can simply send a quick message to each other, it negates the need to go to the trouble of drafting and sending an email. Slack speeds up the communication process by an order of magnitude, and it makes your company more productive in the process.

22. Around 79% of businesses report that Slack improves team culture.

(SlackHQ)

Team culture is a bit of a shadowy concept tied to new-age developments in the workplace. Most people consider this term to mean the group of values, attitudes, and connections that are shared within the team. Whatever team culture is, Slack customers say it has improved since they started using the platform. According to info provided by Slack, 79% of businesses say using Slack has improved their team culture. After all, nothing builds a rapport with your colleagues more than sending them an endless stream of cat videos.

23. Slack has a 90% retention rate among users.

(Survey Monkey)

Retention is one of the most important metrics of basically any service, product, or piece of software. It refers to, in simple terms, the percentage of people who keep using your service or product after a certain time period. Slack online statistics provided by Survey Monkey indicate that Slack has absolutely no problems in keeping its users. On a week-to-week basis, Slack has a 90% retention rate.

24. Slack has over 1,500 app integrations.

(Slack)

One of the main reasons Slack is so appealing to businesses is the sheer number of app integrations it offers. There are now applications for customer support, HR, calls, meetings, employee vacations - you name it. This plethora of apps allows Slack to become much more than just a messaging platform; it’s now basically a one-stop shop for all work- and office-related services. Currently, there are more than 1,500 apps in the Slack app marketplace. Furthermore, the Slack API allows users to create their own tools and integrations.

Slack market statistics

25. Slack grew from 80 to 385 employees in 14 months.

(Business Insider)

Slack’ growth might be slowing down since it went public and in the shadow of its main competitor, Microsoft Teams. However, we should not forget that Slack was one of the fastest-growing startups ever. In 2016, Business Insider reported that over the span of 14 months, Slack’s number of employees grew from 80 to 385. This means the company’s workforce grew almost five-fold during that period.

26. The team collaborative applications market is worth $3.5 billion in 2019.

(Vox)

The team collaborative applications market - which includes apps like Slack and Microsoft Teams - shows no signs of slowing down. From owners to managers, everyone aims to improve their employees’ efficiency. Therefore, any applications that streamline and optimize workflow are invaluable. The research firm IDC reports that the team collaborative applications market is currently worth $3.5 billion. Combined with other market figures, Slack statistics show that in the next three years, the market is estimated to grow by almost 70%.

27. Slack was worth almost $20 billion on its first day of trading.

(MarketWatch)

The biggest news concerning Slack in 2019 is that it went public in June this year. Going public refers to a company becoming publicly traded. In simple terms, this means that its shares became purchasable by the public. The most-common way to go public is via an IPO - an initial public offering. This listing method involves investment banks - which act as underwriters and intermediaries - buying shares from insiders and selling them to the public. This entails raising new outside capital, but also involves high bank fees that come with underwriting.

Slack, however, chose the road less traveled. Instead of an IPO, the company choose to engage in a DPO (direct public offering). With DPOs, employees and investors directly transform their ownership into stocks, which can then be bought by the general public. Spotify is the first major company to choose the same listing method - it did so in 2018.

Slack statistics show that on the first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange, Slack had a market capitalization of $19.5 billion, almost three times more than in its last round of private funding during 2018 ($7.1 billion).

28. Slack shares have plunged by more than 43% since the company went public.

(Forbes)

Ever since Slack’s initial public success, its stocks have been in freefall, raising concerns about whether Slack growth will ever reach its previous highs. Slack opened at $38.50 on June 20, 2019 and reached $42 on the same day. Just a few months later, the stock price has fallen to $21.94, marking a 43% drop from the initial listing value. Forbes, which published its article when Slack’s stock price was $26, lists several reasons for this massive drop. The reasons include concerns about the competition, forecast losses due to a drop in shares, and investigations into Slack’s possible violations of federal security laws.

29. Investigations into possible violations of federal security laws by Slack caused a 4% drop in stock prices in September 2019.

(Forbes)

It never rains, but it pours. A law firm has initiated an investigation into Slack’s possible violations of federal securities laws. This is due to the very low selling cost of shares, which caused damage to the investors. The news of this investigation caused Slack stocks to drop by a further 4%.

30.  For the full fiscal year of 2020, Slack expects a total revenue of between $603 and $610 million, with a year-on-year growth of 51% to 52%.

(Slack)

On September 4, 2019, Slack announced impressive financial results that answer the question: “How big is Slack?” emphatically. For its financial outlooks for the full 2020 fiscal year, Slack announced it expects total revenue between $603 and $610 million. This would be a year-on-year growth rate of between 51% and 52%.

31. Almost 60% of venture capital-funded startups use Slack.

(Kruze Consulting)

The newest data shows that Microsoft Teams has exceeded Slack in the total number of users. However, when we look at Slack statistics, this app is still the preferred choice in some niches. Kruze Consulting conducted research on spending among 200 venture capital-funded startups. That data shows that Slack is the prefered choice among these startups, with almost 60% of them choosing Slack as their app of choice.

32. Microsoft Teams has gained more users in three years than Slack has in six.

(UCToday)

Slack vs Teams is the name of the game in the market currently. Tech giant Microsoft’s player in the team collaborative apps market, Microsoft Teams, has recently reached the threshold of 13 million daily users. This took Microsoft only three years, while Slack took six years to reach 12 million daily users.