The web client was not standalone, and required the user’s phone to stay on and connected to the internet. Since then, linked devices support has expanded and more information is written in the Platform Support part of this article. In October 2020, WhatsApp rolled out a feature allowing users to mute both individuals and group chats forever. According to the company, messages could be edited within a 15-minute window after being sent.
App Functionality
Three days after announcing the Facebook purchase, Koum said they were working to introduce voice calls. Although Acton was working on another startup idea, he decided to join the company. Koum then hired a friend in Los Angeles, Chris Peiffer, to develop a BlackBerry Tuuri Kasino version, which arrived two months later. However, when early versions of WhatsApp kept crashing, Koum considered giving up and looking for a new job. A month earlier, after Koum purchased an iPhone, he and Acton decided to create an app for the App Store. The idea started off as an app that would display statuses in a phone’s Contacts menu, showing if a person was at work or on a call.
- In May 2019, WhatsApp was attacked by hackers who installed spyware on a number of victims’ smartphones.
- The idea, he said, is to develop a group of basic internet services that would be free of charge to use – “a 911 for the internet”.
- The new privacy policy would not apply within the EU, as it is illegal under the GDPR.
- In January 2021, WhatsApp announced an updated privacy policy which stated that WhatsApp would share user data with Facebook and its “family of companies” beginning February 2021.
- In December 2023, WhatsApp’s “View Once” feature expanded to include voice messages.
- At that point WhatsApp was adding about 25 million new users every month, or 833,000 active users per day.
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In January 2021, WhatsApp announced an updated privacy policy which stated that WhatsApp would share user data with Facebook and its “family of companies” beginning February 2021. Previously, users could opt-out of such data sharing, but the new policy removed this option. The new privacy policy would not apply within the EU, as it is illegal under the GDPR. There were a series of incidents between 2017 and 2020, after which WhatsApp announced changes for Indian users of the platform that labels forwarded messages as such. In February 2015, WhatsApp implemented voice calling, which helped WhatsApp to attract a different segment of the user population.
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- Visual effects also became available, adding visual filters to a user’s video feed.
- Both Telegram and Signal in particular were reported to get registration spikes during WhatsApp outages and controversies.
- The messages involved discussing how to make an explosive device and a confession to the attack.
- In October 2020, WhatsApp rolled out a feature allowing users to mute both individuals and group chats forever.
- In November 2023, WhatsApp added a “voice chat” feature for groups with more than 32 members.
- In February 2015, WhatsApp implemented voice calling, which helped WhatsApp to attract a different segment of the user population.
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Platform support
WhatsApp Payments (marketed as WhatsApp Pay) is a peer-to-peer money transfer feature. WhatsApp has been officially supported for iPads and its iPadOS since May 27, 2025. In July 2025, WhatsApp stopped developing the Windows UWP-based app due to poor support and deprecation of the UWP framework by Microsoft. In 2023, WhatsApp replaced the Electron-based apps with native versions for their respective platforms. As of 2025, the software requires at least Android version 5.0 or iOS version 15.1 respectively. WhatsApp also introduced chat filters, allowing users to sort their chats by All, Unread or Groups.
Brazil
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- WhatsApp also introduced chat filters, allowing users to sort their chats by All, Unread or Groups.
- In July 2025, WhatsApp stopped developing the Windows UWP-based app due to poor support and deprecation of the UWP framework by Microsoft.
- However, when early versions of WhatsApp kept crashing, Koum considered giving up and looking for a new job.
- Koum then hired a friend in Los Angeles, Chris Peiffer, to develop a BlackBerry version, which arrived two months later.
- On February 24, 2017, WhatsApp launched a new Status feature similar to Snapchat and Facebook stories.
- A month earlier, after Koum purchased an iPhone, he and Acton decided to create an app for the App Store.
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By February 2013, WhatsApp had about 200 million active users and 50 staff members. The service was created by WhatsApp Inc. of Mountain View, California, which was acquired by Facebook in February 2014 for approximately US$19.3 billion. It became the world’s most popular messaging application in 2015, with 900 million users, and had more than 2 billion active users worldwide in February 2020. The ban was prompted by concerns of US authorities potentially accessing user data for such apps because of the CLOUD Act. The army recommended that all army personnel use Threema instead, as the service is based in Switzerland. This new encryption feature added an additional layer of protection to chat backups stored either on Apple iCloud or Google Drive.
Signal – Private Messenger
Linked devices automatically log out after 14 days of inactivity on the primary phone. In June 2023, a feature called WhatsApp Channels was launched which allows content creators, public figures and organizations to send newsletter-like broadcasts to large numbers of users. Unlike messages in groups or private chats, channels are not end-to-end encrypted. In October 2023 they also introduced passkey support, where a user can verify their login with on-device biometrics, rather than SMS. In November 2023, WhatsApp also began rolling out support for sending login codes to a linked email address, rather than via SMS. Voice calls between two accounts were added to the app in March and April 2015.
Third-party clients
Rudd publicly called for police and intelligence agencies to be given access to WhatsApp and other encrypted messaging services to prevent future terror attacks. In September 2022, a critical security issue in WhatsApp’s Android video call feature was reported. The desktop version was first only available to Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone users. Similar to voice messages, this feature allows users to record and send short videos directly in a chat.
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Whatsapps Channels.
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In September 2017, WhatsApp’s co-founder Brian Acton left the company to start a nonprofit group, later revealed as the Signal Foundation, which developed the WhatsApp competitor Signal. Both airlines had previously launched customer services on the Facebook Messenger platform. In June 2009, when the app had been downloaded by only a handful of Fishman’s Russian-speaking friends, Apple launched push technology, allowing users to be pinged even when not using the app.
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On May 9, 2014, the government of Iran announced that it had proposed to block the access to WhatsApp service to Iranian residents. WhatsApp is owned by Meta, whose main social media service Facebook has been blocked in China since 2009. In September 2017, security researchers reported to The New York Times that the WhatsApp service had been completely blocked in China. According to WhatsApp, the exploit “targeted at least 100 human-rights defenders, journalists and other members of civil society” among a total of 1,400 users in 20 countries. Higher usage was reported by frontline clinical staff to keep up with care needs, even though NHS trust policies do not permit their use. In 2016, WhatsApp was widely praised for the addition of end-to-end encryption and earned a 6 out of 7 points on the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s “Secure Messaging Scorecard”.