Voip functionality WhatsApp is accessible to all Android users

WhatsApp’s voip functionality is now available to anyone with the Android version of the app. Until now, the service only worked on an invite basis: a user had to be called by someone with the VoIP function to be able to call people themselves.

WhatsApp seems to have quietly opened the gates to VoIP functionality. Until now, a call from another user who already had the functionality was required to be able to use it yourself. It is unclear when the functionality was opened, but it is certain that this was not the case last Thursday.

Users don’t need to update to use the feature: if they have the latest WhatsApp version for Android, which came out on March 14, the functionality is now available.

The change was first noticed by the DroidApp website. WhatsApp founder Jan Koum already hinted at the change on Twitter, by saying the famous words to post that were the first to be sent over a telephone connection.

For the time being, the calling function only works on Android. When exactly the functionality will come to iOS users is unknown, but according to WhatsApp it will happen “soon”.