Facebook is reportedly adding VoIP calling to its iOS Messenger app for UK customers, following the introduction of free voice calls for users in Canada and the USA earlier this year.

Customers with the Facebook Messenger iOS app will be able to use the app for voice calls as well as text-based messaging.

Facebook has set up partnerships with a number of mobile network operators to provide customers with free or cut-price data access to Facebook messaging.

The reduced prices - described as a ‘promotion’ by Facebook - will be available via the Facebook Messenger iOS and Android applications as well as the Facebook for Every Phone app for Java-enabled handsets.

Inq, the Hutchison Whampoa subsidiary that started life five years ago as a mobile phone manufacturer before changing its focus to mobile software, has released the beta version of its new Material application.

Material is described as a ‘content discovery service’ that creates a twice-daily electronic magazine from information from the user’s Twitter and Facebook feeds.