I just spent a few minutes going through some recent feeds and saw this post on the WhatsApp blog titled “WhatsApp support for mobile devices” with this notice:
So, by the end of 2016, we will be ending support for WhatsApp Messenger on the following mobile platforms:
- BlackBerry, including BlackBerry 10
- Nokia S40
- Nokia Symbian S60
- Android 2.1 and Android 2.2
- Windows Phone 7.1
That is pretty interesting. I wonder how much this will impact already dropping BlackBerry user figures? BBM doesn’t seem to have quite as much traction as WhatsApp (not much does) and with WhatsApp support falling away for BlackBerry devices during the course of this year, I can see even more people switching away from BlackBerry devices.
I did a little digging online and, according to Wikipedia, BBM had about 190 million users in 2015. Earlier this month The Verge reported that WhatsApp had over a billion users. Facebook Messenger doesn’t seem to support BlackBerry directly either, except perhaps through a mobile Web interface?
Bottom line for BlackBerry users is that 2016 is the year to make a decision between a new device or an unsupported version of WhatsApp (if WhatsApp will continue to work?).
WhatsApp logo credit: WhatsApp