China’s mobile operators expect subscribers to send around 14 billion text messages during the week long holiday for the Chinese New Year, according to local reports.

Festivities for the Year of the Pig began at the weekend and the country’s two mobile providers, China Mobile and China Unicom are bracing themselves for a barrage of messages.

During last year’s New Year holiday, Chinese subscribers sent over 12 billion SMSes.

According to Informa Telecoms & Media’s World Cellular Information Service (WCIS), there were 451.5 million mobile subscribers in China at the end of January.