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With more than an approximate one billion monthly active users across the world, WhatsApp became the most popular instant messaging application in recent times. The introduction of WhatsApp features like voice calling, video calling and emojis contributed to its popularity and rise in user base. But, there is a bad news for active WhatsApp users, especially those who are using the messaging application in their older versions of smartphones. From 2017, the messaging application will not support some Android, Windows and iOS phones. A spokesperson of WhatsApp said that the older iOS, Windows and Android phones are not capable enough to support WhatsApp’s new features that were introduced recently, the most prominent one being the ‘video calling’ feature.

Android devices running on Android 2.1 (Eclair) and Android 2.2 (Froyo) or below will not support WhatsApp from 2017. Google's recent statistics has revealed that only 0.1 percent of Android devices will be affected by this. Android phones with Ice Cream Sandwich, Android Jelly Bean or any version above will be WhatsApp-compatible.

Speaking of iOS, any Apple device running on iOS 6 or versions below will not support WhatsApp from the beginning of 2017. Apple's 2016 data revealed that around 8 percent Apple devices run on iOS 9 or versions below that. Users with iPhone 4, 4S and 5, need to upgrade their phones to continue enjoying WhatsApp. There is a bad news for those using Windows 7 phone too. WhatsApp will not support Windows phone from next year onwards.

On the contrary, users with BlackBerry 10, Nokia S40, Symbian S60 and BBOS will get to enjoy WhatsApp on their smartphones till June 2017.