WhatsApp turns seven, announces plans to end support for outdated OS’s

WhatsApp, while turning seven years old, announced that it will no longer be supporting various outdated Operating systems in the near future.

This news was announced via an article, posted on WhatsApp’s official blog, which informed that this end of support is set to take effect by the end of 2016, whereby support for WhatsApp Messenger will end for the following mobile platforms: BlackBerry, including BlackBerry 10, Nokia S40, Nokia Symbian S602, Android 2.1 and Android 2.2 and Windows Phone 7.1.

“Earlier this week WhatsApp turned seven years old. 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,” the post read.

“But anniversary dates are also an opportunity to look back. When we started WhatsApp in 2009, people’s use of mobile devices looked very different from today. The Apple App Store was only a few months old. About 70 percent of smartphones sold at the time had operating systems offered by BlackBerry and Nokia. Mobile operating systems offered by Google, Apple and Microsoft – which account for 99.5 percent of sales today – were on less than 25 percent of mobile devices sold at the time,” it continued

With views to improve services for its subscribers, who recently reached one billion, WhatsApp is set to focus its efforts on mobile platforms the vast majority of people use, a fete which the messenger hopes to accomplish the next seven years.

WhatsApp informed that the reason it is ending support for the above mentioned platforms is because, they don’t offer the kind of capabilities the App developer’s needs to expand the app’s features in the future.

“This was a tough decision for us to make, but the right one in order to give people better ways to keep in touch with friends, family, and loved ones using WhatsApp. If you use one of these affected mobile devices, we recommend upgrading to a newer Android, iPhone, or Windows Phone before the end of 2016 to continue using WhatsApp.” It concluded.