WhatsApp to bring in ads in bid to monetise 1.5 billion users 

WhatsApp said that it will be placing ads in the Status section of the app as well as promoting certain channels with companies able to pay for prominent placement in either sections.

Communications app WhatsApp is to begin rolling out ads as its parent company Meta pushes to further monetise the platform.

Facebook, which would go on to become Meta, purchased WhatsApp in 2014 for $19.3bn (€16.7bn). Users originally had to pay a $1 annual fee to use the service but this was removed after the acquisition.

While WhatsApp has been one of Meta’s fastest growing services, the company has been slow to monetise the app since its acquisition. However, this latest announcement means that ads will now be seen in the Updates tab of the app which currently houses the Channels section as well as the Status section.

WhatsApp said that it will be placing ads in the Status section of the app as well as promoting certain channels with companies able to pay for prominent placement in either sections.

WhatsApp will also be rolling out Channel subscriptions where people can pay for “exclusive updates” from the people or companies they follow.

“These new features will appear only on the Updates tab, away from your personal chats. This means if you only use WhatsApp to chat with friends and loved ones there is no change to your experience at all,” the company said.

WhatsApp said these new features are built in the “most private way possible” with personal messages, calls, and statuses remaining end-to-end encrypted meaning the company cannot read them.

However, the company said it will use info such as country or city location, language, as well as Channels already followed to curate ads to users.

“We will never sell or share your phone number to advertisers. Your personal messages, calls and groups you are in will not be used to determine the ads you may see,” WhatsApp promised.

The company said WhatsApp is used by 1.5 billion people a day and that it has been working on these changes for two years.

GDPR fines

Given that Meta’s European operations are headquartered in Ireland, WhatsApp is subject to oversight from the Data Protection Commissioner (DPC) which has leveled very significant fines against the platform in recent years.

In 2021, the company was hit with a €225m fine by the DPC after a GDPR investigation into how it shares information with other Facebook companies. In 2023, it was fined another €5.5m for an additional breach of GDPR.

Meta decided to appeal these fines to the Court of Justice of the European Union which is expected to rule on the matter in the coming months.

These fines are on top of the numerous other fines levelled on Meta for various breaches. Just last year, the DPC fined the company €91m for improperly storing the passwords of certain social media users on its internal systems. This fine is also being appealed.