Back in 2009, when WhatsApp started taking on users, the Apple store was only a few months old… Most users were on devices and operating systems that today just seem… vintage. So, seven years later, with BlackBerry and Nokia practically out of the way, WhatsApp has decided to kill off support for them.
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In a blog post, released earlier this week the company explains,
[quote]It has been an amazing journey and in the coming months we’re putting an even greater emphasis on security features and more ways to stay in touch with the people that you care about… When we started WhatsApp in 2009, people’s use of mobile devices looked very different from today… As we look ahead to our next seven years, we want to focus our efforts on the mobile platforms the vast majority of people use.[/quote]
7 years ago, 70% of smartphones were using BlackBerry and Nokia’s Symbian OS’s… Google, Apple and Microsoft were only on 25% of users’s smartphones. They “account for 99.5 percent of sales today”. Therefore, WhatsApp has decided to go with the times and end support for the following platforms by the end of 2016.
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- – BlackBerry, including BlackBerry 10
- – Nokia S40
- – Nokia Symbian S60
- – Android 2.1 and Android 2.2
- – Windows Phone 7.1
My suggestion, and WhatsApp’s as well, is that you should probably upgrade to a newer device that uses up-to-date Android, iOS or Windows operating systems, to stay in touch on the messaging app. Oh well… you’ve been warned.