WhatsApp is used by millions of people around the world and for most of us, it is the easiest app to connect with family and friends. Apart from connecting with friends and family through messages, the platform also allows users to post status updates so that they can share important information with their contacts. And recently, WhatsApp has made the status update feature even better. The company has been experimenting with several features for status updates for the past few days. And now, it is being reported that Meta is experimenting with a new ranking system based on which WhatsApp status updates of your favourite contacts will be prioritised.

According to a report by WA Beta Info, WhatsApp is implementing a new ranking feature for status updates. This feature updates the order of status updates in the list, ensuring that updates from important contacts are always shown at the top.

Notably, WhatsApp is prioritising contacts it deems important, and WhatsApp status updates are always placed at the top of the list to ensure that users receive important information and updates directly from the platform.

This prioritization of contacts is based on a ranking system developed by WhatsApp that considers a number of factors to produce statistics that identify important contacts. These factors include frequent contacts, which indicate a high level of interaction and importance; pinned contacts, where pinned chats are prioritized within the Updates tab; recent messages, which indicate the urgency and relevance of the conversation; and expiring status updates, ensuring users can see timely updates before they disappear.

Furthermore, the report states that due to this new ranking system, users may notice that the timestamp of status updates is no longer displayed in the list. This change reflects prioritizing updates from important contacts over displaying timestamps. It is also worth noting that the ranking of status updates relies on information stored exclusively on the user’s device, which ensures privacy by not sharing any data with WhatsApp servers. This system operates autonomously within each individual user’s device, promising to maintain user privacy and data security.

It’s important to note that these statistics are reset whenever a user reinstalls WhatsApp. Since the data indicating contact priority is not shared with WhatsApp, it is lost during the reinstallation process. Additionally, the order of status updates may appear slightly different on linked devices. This is due to the chat history synced to the device, which may not contain the full dataset needed to prioritize contacts in the same way. So, while the general principles of prioritization remain consistent, the specific order of contacts may vary slightly between devices. This is also why the ranking system may not be accurate after reinstalling or linking a new device.

The new ranking feature for status updates is available to some users who install the latest update of WhatsApp for Android from the Google Play Store, and is expected to be made available to even more users in the coming weeks.