News > Social Media WhatsApp Drops Support for Older Phones You'll need to upgrade iOS or Android to keep using the app By Rob LeFebvre Rob LeFebvre Facebook Twitter Associate Editorial Director, News UCLA California State University, Northridge Rob LeFebvre is the Associate Editorial Director, News for Lifewire. He has been a technology writer for more than 12 years with articles appearing in 148Apps, Cult of Mac, Engadget, and more. lifewire's editorial guidelines Updated on February 4, 2020 12:40PM EST Tweet Share Email Tweet Share Email Social Media Mobile Phones Internet & Security Computers & Tablets Smart Life Home Theater & Entertainment Software & Apps Social Media Streaming Gaming What: WhatsApp, the popular encrypted chat app owned by Facebook, is ending support for smartphones running older OS software.How: WhatsApp only supports iPhones running iOS 9 or later and Android smartphones running version 4.0.3 or later.Why Do You Care: If you're still relying on an older phone, you'll need to upgrade it or its OS to match the current supported specs to continue using WhatsApp. Getty Images As of February 1, 2020, WhatsApp will only support iPhones running iOS 9 or later, Android phones running Android 4.0.3 or later, and "select phones running KaiOS 2.5.1+, including JioPhone, and JioPhone 2." WhatsApp's support page says phones running older systems have been able to use the popular chat app until that date, implying the app will no longer work on these older mobile operating systems. While Apple doesn't typically release numbers on how many current phones are running which specific iOS versions, iOS developer David Smith reports that zero percent of his app users still run iOS 8. The adoption rate of new iOS versions is typically fairly high; Digital Trends reports that 88 percent of iOS users were updated to iOS 12 a year after its release. Google does share specific numbers, however, on its distribution dashboard. Only 0.3 percent of Android devices are currently using Android Gingerbread (2.3.3 - 2.3.7). That may seem like a small amount, but it works out to about 75 million people using the older OS globally. If that number includes you, and you want to keep using WhatsApp, you'll need to update your device to a later OS, or upgrade the device itself if it's upgraded as far as the hardware will allow. Via: Digital Trends Was this page helpful? Thanks for letting us know! Get the Latest Tech News Delivered Every Day Email Address Sign up There was an error. Please try again. You're in! Thanks for signing up. There was an error. Please try again. Thank you for signing up! Tell us why! Other Not enough details Hard to understand Submit