MENLO PARK, California — Social messaging service WhatsApp has discontinued its services for Nokia S40 phones and several old Android and iOS versions.
In a blog post, the Facebook-owned service said: “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. Those who own a phone powered by this very platform has no choice but to upgrade their device if they wish to continue using WhatsApp.”
There are several Nokia phones that have been affected by the new ban.
From the Asha series: Nokia Asha 201, Nokia Asha 205 Chat Edition, Nokia Asha 210, Nokia Asha 230 Single SIM, Nokia Asha 230 Dual SIM, Nokia Asha 300, Nokia Asha 302, Nokia Asha 303, Nokia Asha 305, Nokia Asha 306, Nokia Asha 308, Nokia Asha 309, Nokia Asha 310, Nokia Asha 311, Nokia Asha 500, Nokia Asha 501, Nokia Asha 502 and Nokia Asha 503.
Other older models include Nokia 206, Nokia 208, Nokia 301, Nokia 515, Nokia C3-00, Nokia C3-01, Nokia X2-00, Nokia X2-01, Nokia X3-02 and Nokia X3-02.5.
This is not the first time the California-based company has withdrawn support for phones. Previously, the company had discontinued the support for Nokia Symbian S60, BlackBerry OS, BlackBerry 10 and Windows Phone 8.0.
The users of following operating systems can no longer create a new account, however, they will be able to continue using WhatsApp on:
- Android versions 2.3.7 and older until February 1, 2020
- iOS 7 and older until February 1, 2020
If you are currently using these older versions, it is recommended that you update to the following operating systems:
- Android running OS 4.0+
- Windows Phone 8.1 +
- iPhone running iOS 8+
For WhatsApp users on Nokia S40 phones, chat backups can’t be carried over to an Android or iOS device due to platform limitations.
However, on an Android or iOS device, users will need to log in with their phone number in order to keep using the same WhatsApp ID.
Currently, WhatsApp is available for Android, iOS and Windows 10 Mobile only.
