WhatsApp has increasingly drawn its innovation from competing services, such as a Telegram-inspired web version and features for groups. According to Globes, already by 2013 the application was installed on 92% of all smartphones, with 86% of users reporting daily use. In May 2025, Meta reported WhatsApp had over 3 billion monthly active users globally. On August 24, 2014, Koum announced on his Twitter account that WhatsApp had over 600 million active users worldwide. The hack, allegedly developed by Israeli surveillance technology firm NSO Group, injected malware onto WhatsApp users' phones via a remote-exploit bug in the app's Voice over IP calling functions.
Supported Features
For security purposes, since February 1, 2020, WhatsApp has been made unavailable on smartphones using legacy operating systems like Android 2.3.7 or older and iPhone iOS 8 or older that are no longer updated by their providers. The bug was discovered by Check Point in August 2019 and reported to WhatsApp. WhatsApp released a statement saying that "the feature is working properly", and that images stored in the camera roll cannot be deleted due to Apple's security layers. In September 2019, WhatsApp was criticized for its implementation of a 'delete for everyone' feature. WhatsApp was criticized by security researchers and the Electronic Frontier Foundation for using backups that are not covered by end-to-end encryption and allow messages to be accessed by third-parties. Researchers and journalists called on WhatsApp's parent company, Facebook, to adopt measures similar to those adopted in India and restrict the spread of hoaxes and fake news.
User statistics
Providing a bundle of these free of charge to users will work like a gateway drug of sorts – users who may be able to afford data services and phones these days just don't see the point of why they would pay for those data services. WhatsApp 2.0, released for iPhone in August 2009, featured a purpose-designed messaging component; the number of active users suddenly increased to 250,000. 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. As of May 2025, the service had 3 billion monthly active users, making it the most used messenger app. WhatsApp is reportedly expanding access to its refreshed About section, bringing new auto expiring status messages to more iOS users with the latest App Store update. The directive will also mean that the companion web services, such as WhatsApp Web, will not be available uninterrupted to users, as they will be automatically logged out every six hours.
- The new version seeks to address this by automatically removing old content and giving predefined time frames for quick posting.
- It was also not available for iOS users on launch, due to limitations from Apple.
- In October 2023 they also introduced passkey support, where a user can verify their login with on-device biometrics, rather than SMS.
- Open Whisper Systems said that they had already incorporated the protocol into the latest WhatsApp client for Android, and that support for other clients, group/media messages, and key verification would be coming soon after.
- The Cloud API enables businesses to integrate WhatsApp with other software, have a central WhatsApp account for multiple users and implement advanced automation.
WhatsApp Business
Koum updated WhatsApp so that everyone in the user's network would be notified when a user's status changed. However, when early versions of WhatsApp kept crashing, Koum considered giving up and looking for a new job. Koum named the app WhatsApp to sound like "what's up" and it was published on the Apple App Store and BlackBerry App World in May and June 2009 respectively.
The messages involved discussing how to make an explosive device and a confession to the attack. In December 2015, it was reported that terrorist organization ISIS had been using WhatsApp to plot the November 2015 Paris attacks. In its revelation via documents received via court, the group claimed that the lawsuit brought against the company by WhatsApp threatened to infringe on its clients' "national security and foreign policy concerns". In May 2019, WhatsApp was attacked by hackers who installed spyware on a number of victims' smartphones.
Users can set About messages that disappear after a chosen duration.
The developer indicated that this app supports the following accessibility features. The developer, WhatsApp Inc., indicated that this app supports the following accessibility features to help make common tasks in the app faster and easier to complete. You can also use call links and screen-sharing to make group calls and collaboration easy.Stay connected in real timeYou can share your location with those in your individual or group chats while using WhatsApp on your mobile phone.
VoiceOver
WhatsApp's voice codec is Opus, which uses the modified discrete cosine transform (MDCT) and linear predictive coding (LPC) audio compression algorithms. Some devices using dual SIMs may not be compatible with WhatsApp, though there are unofficial workarounds to install the app. Similarly to WhatsApp for web, Windows, Mac, and smartwatches, the iPad is a type of linked device that connects and syncs to WhatsApp running on a smartphone. WhatsApp has been mexican bar toronto officially supported for iPads and its iPadOS since May 27, 2025. The Windows version is based on UWP while the Mac version is a port of the iOS version using Catalyst technology.
In December 2021, the Swiss army banned the use of WhatsApp and several other non-Swiss encrypted messaging services by army personnel. In April 2017, the perpetrator of the Stockholm truck attack reportedly used WhatsApp to exchange messages with an ISIS supporter shortly before and after the incident. Rudd publicly called for police and intelligence agencies to be given access to WhatsApp and other encrypted messaging services to prevent future terror attacks. However, the company did not reveal the names of the end users, which according to research by Citizen Lab include, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kazakhstan, Morocco, Mexico and the United Arab Emirates.
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