WhatsApp

The popular messaging app WhatsApp Messenger is ditching its annual subscription fee. WhatsApp founder Jan Koum announced today that the service will be completely free for all users. The company will instead offer other services through the app, such as the ability to communicate with third-party businesses and organizations.

"It really doesn’t work that well,” Koum said Monday, speaking at the DLD conference in Munich (via Redcode). "We just don’t want people to think at some point their communication to the world will be cut off."

The popular messaging service WhatsApp joined the list of 3D Touch-enabled apps like Facebook, Dropbox and Shazam. WhatsApp version 2.12.8 adds "Peek and Pop pictures, videos, links, contact cards, and locations," according to the changelog. The update does not add a Quick Action menu from the Home screen.

Sending messages with Whatsapp can be convenient, except there is no option to schedule a pre-set message for delivery. The appropriately named jailbreak tweak Message Scheduler for Whatsapp changes this by adding scheduling functionality directly to the app.

Once installed, Message Scheduler for Whatsapp has no settings to configure. The tweak works by adding a button titled "Schedule a message" to the message menu. Simply tap this option and choose the date and time when message delivery is desired.

WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum announced today that the messaging app will add voice call support in Q2 of this year. The announcement was made at Mobile World Congress currently being held in Barcelona, Spain.

Koum said the new service will first be available on iOS and Android before landing on some BlackBerry and Nokia devices later in the year. The CEO also added that WhatsApps currently has 465 million monthly active users, and that 15 million of those users joined after Facebook bought the app for $19 billion last week.