Last month, WhatsApp was reportedly planning to start serve advert on its instants messaging app and it seems, the company has started serving ads on the platform. iOS users will be the first people to receive the update.
It’s already been confirmed that the WhatsApp is planning to run ads inside the Status tab of the app. Remember that the ‘Status‘ tab was the middle tab you see in your WhatsApp window, i.e. between the ‘Chats‘ and ‘Calls‘ tabs. Similar to Snapchat Stories features, photos or video posted inside Status disappear after 24 hours.
What is still not clear at this point is if the ads in question will be targeted. After all, WhatsApp messages are encrypted, which means users’ data cannot be accessible to Facebook for mining.
And I want to add: WhatsApp is already working to implement ads in the iOS app. https://t.co/eL55pu1kFR
— WABetaInfo (@WABetaInfo) September 27, 2018
This feature is still under test stage, and it’s just a matter of time before iPhone users start seeing ads and then Android users.