Meta Platforms operates Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp under its corporate name adopted in 2021.
The company was founded as Facebook by Mark Zuckerberg and fellow Harvard students in 2004. Facebook initially focused on social networking and later expanded through acquisitions, including Instagram in 2012 and WhatsApp in 2014.
In October 2021, Facebook, Inc. changed its corporate name to Meta Platforms, Inc. The rebranding reflected a strategic emphasis on the metaverse, a term used for interconnected immersive digital environments. Facebook remained the name of one of the company's major social-networking products.
The name change does not mean that Facebook disappeared. Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp continue as distinct products, while Meta Platforms is the parent company. Market capitalization refers to the parent company's publicly traded equity, not to the value of an individual app.