LinkedIn Lite joins the lite app bandwagon

We’ve seen quite a few “Lite” versions of popular social networking apps in recent years, now it’s time for LinkedIn to jump on the bandwagon with LinkedIn Lite.

Yep, the professional network has released LinkedIn Lite for Android in India, TechCrunch reports. So what’s actually “lite” about it?

The publication says that the new app is 1MB in size, making it ideal for low-end smartphones that have a tiny amount of storage. It’s also claimed that the app is optimised for slower connections, with pages loading in under five seconds, “even on a 2G network”.

That doesn’t mean that you’ve got significantly hobbled functionality though, as users are still able to search for (and make) connections, chat, see job openings, edit profiles and get news feed updates.

LinkedIn Lite offers the same functionality as the normal app, but with a reduced data footprint

The new app is out in India right now, but LinkedIn reportedly plans to launch in 60 countries in the coming weeks and months.

It’s not the first time we’ve seen Lite apps for social media either, with Facebook previously launching Facebook Lite and Messenger Lite. Both apps drastically reduce their storage footprint, while also cutting back on data usage. Twitter has also launched Twitter Lite, being a web app for data-conscious users.

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It’s not the first time that a Microsoft-owned service has developed a Lite app either, with Skype Lite previously being released in India. Skype’s lightweight app touts communication under “limited network conditions”, a smaller install size and a data usage monitor.

LinkedIn Lite isn’t available outside of India just yet, so you’ll want to use a third-party app repository like APKMirror to get in on the action. Do be warned that this isn’t an official source for LinkedIn Lite.