14 DAY TRIAL // 2018 comes with several big changes for users of older mobile platforms, including end of support for one of the most popular instant messaging services out there.
Starting January 1, WhatsApp will pull support for Windows Phone 8.0 or older, BlackBerry OS and BlackBerry 10, with the company announcing that users of these operating systems will no longer be allowed to create new accounts or re-verify existing ones.
The application will continue to run normally if it’s already installed and activated on any of these platforms, but “some features may stop functioning at any time,” the company warns.
Outdated platforms
As for the reasons WhatsApp is giving up on older platforms, it’s because the new features that are being added in the latest versions of the app require modern tech that is missing from them.
“These platforms don't offer the kind of capabilities we need to expand our app's features in the future. If you use one of these affected mobile devices, we recommend upgrading to a newer OS version, or to a newer Android running OS 4.0+, iPhone running iOS 7+, or Windows Phone 8.1+ so that you can continue using WhatsApp,” a message posted on the support page reads.
WhatsApp has already pulled support for Android versions older than 2.3.3, Windows Phone 7, iPhone 3GS and iOS 6, and Nokia Symbian S60.
On the Windows phone front, WhatsApp continues to support Windows 10 Mobile despite the decline of the platform, though it’ll be interesting to see for how long the company plans to do this. At this point, developers and users alike are leaving Windows phones, and more big apps are being pulled from the platform, so it won’t be a huge shock to learn that WhatsApp would do the same thing.
It goes without saying that the best WhatsApp experience is available on the latest version of each platform, so unless you upgraded already, consider doing it as soon as possible.