According to new reports, WhatsApp’s Status feature will soon be expanded to include similar abilities to Snapchat Stories.
As part of Facebook’s unremitting campaign to cluster-bomb Snapchat out of existence, WhatsApp’s humble Status option will be the next mobile frontier to benefit from the increasing ubiquity of Snapchat’s Stories features.
As we reported last year, WhatsApp was reportedly testing an expanded Status feature that would enable users to send out self-destructing imagery, text, and videos similarly to how Instagram’s Stories feature functions.
Read: WhatsApp rolls out two-step verification for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone
Now the feature has officially arrived on WhatsApp’s latest iOS beta, where users can share videos and photos in their status that will last for 24 hours.
A report from WABetaInfo reveals that WhatsApp’s Status feature will benefit from an Instagram-style menu in which users will be able to tap on a circular icon and append images or videos to their latest update. Users will further be able to control who sees their updates through a visible link through to WhatsApp’s privacy settings.
The first Status from WhatsApp! (Still hidden)
2.17.5 will be available on AppStore in next days! pic.twitter.com/NTKBk99y1v— WABetaInfo (@WABetaInfo) February 16, 2017
It is reported that, by default, WhatsApp will only display Status updates to contacts found within a user’s device, though this apparently can be tweaked to address all users regardless of whether their contact information is stored with a broadcaster’s device.
WhatsApp’s competition with Snapchat will be an interesting one to watch; Snapchat boasts a reported figure of over 158 million daily users. While there’s scanty information as to how many daily active users WhatsApp boasts, the service recently achieved a new milestone of 1.2 billion monthly active users.
Should Facebook’s bid to impeach some of Snapchat’s core features through WhatsApp prove successful, it could have a tremendous impact on the former company as Facebook’s retinue of products (such as Instagram and Messenger) continue to take the fight to Snap Inc.
Read: WhatsApp is being sued on allegations of data sharing without consent
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Follow Bryan Smith on Twitter: @bryansmithSA
