Ads are coming to WhatsApp

Today, Meta has announced that it's bringing ads to WhatsApp. They will appear in the Updates tab, which is home to both Channels and Status. Meta says the Updates tab is now used by 1.5 billion people per day globally.

There will be ads in Status, which will let you "find a new business and easily start a conversation with them about a product or service they're promoting in Status". There will also be Promoted Channels, which are ads too. These will "help you discover new channels that might be interesting to you when you're looking through the directory", Meta says.

Adjacently, Channel subscriptions will let you pay a monthly fee to receive exclusive updates from Channels. This isn't ad-related, but is also a new feature announced today. Meta thinks confining ads and subscriptions to the Updates tab, "away from your personal chats", will ensure there's "no change to your experience at all" if you only use WhatsApp to chat with friends and loved ones.

Your personal messages, calls, and statuses remain end-to-end encrypted. To show ads in Status and Promoted Channels, WhatsApp will use information like your city or country, language, the Channels you're following and how you interact with the ads you see. If you've added WhatsApp to the Meta Accounts Center, your ad preferences and info from across your Meta accounts will also be used.

Meta promises to never share your phone number with advertisers, and that your personal messages, calls, and groups you are in will not be used to determine the ads you may see. All of these features are going to be rolling out "slowly over the next several months".

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