Snapchat is one of the fastest-growing instant messaging and multimedia mobile app available for all mobile platforms, it has lots of cool features such as filters, lens, story sharing, etc that makes Snapchat a unique app.
The developers keep on updating the app with new features and sometimes it becomes confusing how to get started.
Here in this post, I’ll show how to download Snapchat on your smartphone, Sign up for an account, and how get started with it.
Although this self-destructive photo-sharing app is very simple yet for a new user it could be a little difficult to understand the basic features.
Before we move ahead with downloading and signing up for an account with Snapchat, let’s take a quick look at its main features of it.
Snapchat Features:
- Attractive yellow colored and cool user interface
- Click pictures (called Snap) in-app and send them to your friends.
- Decide for how long you want your friends to view your snap (1-10 sec).
- Use tools like Doodle, Text to add a caption, Stickers, Scissors Tool, Pencil
- Record a video called Snap video and share it with your friends. Decide if you want to let a friend view once or loop it on repeat.
- Save Snaps in Your Memories
- Add Snap to your Story. Decide who you want to let view your story.
- Take multiple snaps and chose which one you want to send.
- Add filters to your snap.
- Add Lens to your Snap before you send it.
- Attach a website with your snap.
- Chat or make video calls to your friend for FREE
- Use Stickers to make your Snap interesting.
- Add a contact with Username, Friends near me, SnapCode, or from your phone’s contacts.
- Make your chat interesting with Emojis. Learn What Different Snapchat Emojis Mean
There are hundreds of more features that you can explore and play around. These are just the basic features that you need to know.
You will learn several other things about this beautiful app as you start using the app frequently (yes, Snapchat is an addiction, wink).
Also see: How register an account with www.gmail.com or signin
How to Download Snapchat:
The process of downloading Snapchat for Android as well as iOS is the same as any other app.
It is available on Google Play & iTunes.
Let’s go ahead and download:
- Pick up your smartphone and head over to Google Play or iTunes. Or go to the official website.
- Go to the Search option and type “Snapchat”
- Snapchat will pop up in the Search Results.
- Tap Snapchat from the results and wait till the download and installation process gets completed.
- When it is done, you will get a notification for the same and you are ready for the next step – Sign up!
How to Sign up for a Snapchat account:
This section lists stepwise instructions for the Snapchat sign-up process. The process is very simple, just follow the steps that are listed below:
- Since you have downloaded and installed Snapchat on your Smartphone, you must have a shortcut created on the home screen. Start the app by tapping the shortcut.
- Click the blue sign-up button.
- Enter your First name & last name and hit the “Sign up & Accept” button at the bottom.
- Enter your date of birth and hit continue.
- Enter Username. You might have to try several times to find the available username. The app has a huge number of users around the world and a lot of usernames that you try for yourself are already taken. Try till you find one which is available. Or you can choose from the suggested usernames. Once you chose a username, tap the continue button.
- Enter the password and tap the continue button.
- Enter your mobile number where you will receive the confirmation code. The moment you enter the mobile number and hit “Continue” you will receive a confirmation code via SMS. It will be automatically entered. Click Continue.
- Log on to your Gmail and confirm the email.
- Congratulations! You have successfully downloaded, installed, and signed up for a Snapchat account.
Get Started with Snapchat:
Once you sign up for a Snapchat account, the next step is to add friends so that you could interact with them through Snapchat.
Let’s take a look at various ways of adding friends on Snapchat.
How to add friends on Snapchat-
There are several ways of adding friends on Snapchat. You can find a friend and add by:
- Username
- My Contacts
- SnapCode
- Nearby
- Share Username
Add Friends by Username: This is a pretty simple method of adding friends on Snapchat. You can add just anyone by his/her username if you know it.
So if you are willing to add your friend by Username, ask for their Snapchat Username.
Once you have the username, open Snapchat on your smartphone, and tap the white ghost icon as shown in the below image.
Tap “Add Friend” as below.
Once you tap “Add Friends” the search bar will appear as below image. Type the username and the user will pop up in the result with an “Add” button next to the username. Tap “Add” to add this friend to your Snapchat.
Add friends with the “My Contacts” option- Open Snapchat, tap the while Ghost on the upper left corner (see above images), then tap “Add Friends” and then go to “My Contacts”.
All those friends in your contact list who are using Snapchat will appear in the list.
Tap on the name of the contact to add and send Snap or to start the Chat.
Add friends with “SnapCode”- That’s a unique feature of Snapchat.
Every user has a unique Snapcode that differentiates him/her from the rest of the users.
No two or more users can have the same SnapCode. It is just like a QR code.
Request your friend to send his/her Snapcode that you can scan to find him/her on Snapchat and Add.
Considering you have a friend’s Snapcode, Tap the white ghost on the upper left corner, then “Add friends” and then “SnapCode”.
When you tap Snapcode, it will take you to the Photos on the smartphone. Select a friend’s SnapCode image and you are ready to add him/her.
Add Friends with the “Nearby” option– Go to Nearby on Snapchat by following the same path as we discussed above, Ghost Icon > Add Friends > Nearby.
Then, ask your friend to turn this option on their device too.
It will start the search automatically and once you find your friend, you can add him/her to your Snapchat friend list.
Add friends with the “Share Username” option – This is pretty simple, Tap “Share username” and select the app you want to share your username with. For Example via WhatsApp, Google Chat, Email, etc.
When your friend gets to see it, he/she may add you to the Snapchat friend list.
How to Start Chat or Send Snap:
Once you have added friends on Snapchat. Tap the friend you want to start to Chat with or send a Snap to.
When you tap, you will see the option to either text or send a snap, choose the one you want to go with.
If you select Chat, a chat box will appear where you can type your message and send it.
There can be several ways of doing that but the simplest one is to open Snapchat and tap the Blue chat icon that appears on the bottom left.
Once you tap this blue Chat button, you need to select the friend you want to start chatting with. For example, I’ve selected the below friend.
You can start chatting simply by tapping in the text box.
When you tap that blank text box, your phone’s keypad will appear and you can start typing the message you want to send to this friend.
Alternatively, you can tap the image icon to send the images from your phone, tap the telephone icon to start a voice call, tap a big round circle that opens the phone camera to click photos within the app itself and send, tap the video option to start a video call or tap emoji icon to send emojis to this particular friend.
When you tap the big circle in the middle and click a selfie, you can show your creativity and edit snap with tools like Doodle, Text, Scissors, Stickers, Paperclip, etc before you send it to a friend.
Also, you can decide for how long you want a friend to view your snap (from 1-10 sec). Moreover, you can save this snap to your memories or add it to your story.