Got cheap, flat-rate Internet access on your phone? Then make sure you install an instant messaging client such as eBuddy Mobile Messenger on your device.

If you already use instant messaging or chat services on your PC then you can use the same accounts on your phone. Probably the best way to do it is to install a multi-network chat client, such as eBuddy Mobile Messenger. The program pulls all your IM accounts into one, allowing you to view everyone who is online and chat to them, no matter which service they're using. eBuddy Mobile Messenger currently supports: MSN, Yahoo!, AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, and Facebook.

After installing the app on your phone, you'll be prompted to sign up for a free eBuddy account. After you've completed the short registration process you're ready to start importing your contacts from your various IM and social networks, which you do just by signing into them all from within eBuddy Mobile Messenger.

Start chatting

When you're all set up, you'll see a list of all your online and offline contacts in the main window of eBuddy Mobile Messenger. Starting a conversation is merely a case of clicking 'Chat' to launch a new chat tab. eBuddy has a number of neat chat options, including the ability to send a picture directly from your phone's camera, insert quicktext from a list of (editable) common phrases, view profile, and add emoticons. On the latter point, the preset emoticons within eBuddy Mobile Messenger are pretty basic. You can download new ones from eBuddy, but not that many.

eBuddy Mobile Messenger comes with a tidy, colorful user interface which is a pleasure to use. The use of tabs helps to keep the screen clutter-free and makes everything clearly visible.

eBuddy Mobile Messenger is great at what it does, but it's a shame it doesn't go quite as far as the likes of Nimbuzz or fring, which both offer VoIP as well as text chat. Even to have Skype text chat would've been a nice addition.

If all you want to do is send instant messages though, eBuddy Mobile Messenger makes it quick and easy to chat across different IM networks.