A new Chinese messaging app has become on social media saying it could be the first real competitor to WeChat. The late August launch of Bullet Messenger comes as WeChat continues its dominance in China. So, what is Bullet Messenger's attraction and its 10 million downloads in just its first month cause for WeChat to worry? CGTN's Wei Lynn Tang has the story.

It's rare meeting someone in China who doesn't use WeChat. The versatile messaging app owned by Tencent has seeped right into the fabric of people's lives here.

"Totally reliant on WeChat, I use it constantly; I also use it just to pay for about everything."

"Among all of my other apps, WeChat is the one I use the most, by far. I communicate with my colleagues, friends and family on it."

"I have to open WeChat once every ten minutes as I worry people might look for me and that I may not reply to them in time."

WEI LYNN TANG CHENGDU "Think of WeChat as very much like WhatsApp, and yet, not quite. For me, WeChat is an almost all-in-one app: besides its core function of messaging, it's a mash-up of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter; where you can share your thoughts and pictures. I use it to make cashless payments for almost everything in China. I can even now hail a car ride through the app. WeChat is also my source of news and discounts at restaurants. And many here use it to play games too."

WeChat has built an ecosystem that goes well beyond just basic messaging. But now, a new messaging app seems ready to disrupt this space. Launched last month, Bullet Messenger has already seen more than 10 million downloads. Its main differentiating point? It has a built-in automatic voice-to-text feature which transcribes the user's voice notes into a text message. One is also able to listen to parts of the audio note, and make changes to the text thereafter. The technology is backed by Chinese voice-recognition expert iFlytek, and other AI companies.

JEFFREY TOWSON, INVESTMENT PROFESSOR PEKING UNIVERSITY "Can Bullet Messenger get to scale in terms of usage in a niche market, before Tencent responds? They've got some sign-ups, that is important. Step 2 is: Are people using it every day?"

So far, the app only transcribes Chinese voice notes, and no English translation is available yet. The CEO of Chinese smartphone maker Smartisan Luo Yonghao, who invested in and launched Bullet Messenger, said on his Weibo account - that he plans to spend around 1 billion yuan in the next six months to lure 100 million new users. What will this mean for Tencent, whose WeChat has a monthly active user base of over 1 billion worldwide?

JEFFREY TOWSON, PROFESSOR OF INVESTMENT PEKING UNIVERSITY'S GUANGHUA SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT "For a niche market quickly they'll do well, but if Tencent responds quickly and does voice to text, that would be bad. Unfortunately, they've got a smart competitor, probably one of the smartest companies in China."

Bullet Messenger has received 21.8 million US dollars via its Series A funding from Smartisan, and from two local venture capital firms.

WEI LYNN TANG CHENGDU "For now, we wait to see if Bullet Messenger will roll out more functions, and if and how WeChat responds. But it's clear that innovation is happening thick and fast right here in China, and this is keeping tech players on their toes. WLT, CGTN, Chengdu in Sichuan province."