WhatsApp has announced the launch of Status Ads and Promoted Channels globally. The Meta-owned messaging service said the move is aimed at making it easier for users to discover new businesses and channels. Conversely, new tools allow businesses to increase their visibility.

Updates – ads and promoted channels – will appear alongside regular WhatsApp statuses with clear labels. Users will be able to skip these ads by swiping past them as they navigate through other status posts. Previously, sponsored content was only available to a limited number of WhatsApp users. Now, WhatsApp has announced on X (formerly Twitter) that these features are available globally.

Status ads and promoted channels will work within the “Updates” tab of the app, which includes both statuses and channels. According to the company’s official business page, ads and promoted channels are designed to appear where users are browsing for updates. The aim is to make it easier to find organizations and brands and for users to start interacting with them directly. However, the ads are limited to the Updates tab only. The company has emphasized that the personal messaging experience will remain unchanged, meaning that individual chats, calls, and statuses will remain “end-to-end encrypted.”

The feature also includes controls that allow users to block or hide ads from specific businesses if users become irritated by their repetitive ads. This gives users more control over what they see in the Updates tab.

In select regions, including parts of Europe, users may also have the option to subscribe to an ad-free experience for statuses and channels. The subscription will remove ads from the Updates tab, although price and availability may vary by platform and location.

WhatsApp has been rapidly updating its platform in an effort to expand its feature set and increase user engagement across chats, groups and channels. Recently, the messaging platform introduced a feature called “Group Chat History.” The feature aims to streamline group conversations for newly joined WhatsApp group members. In this update, group administrators or members can share previous messages in a structured way with someone who has just joined the group, from 25 to up to 100 messages.

Previously, users who were added to a group could only see messages sent after joining, often missing important context and relying on other members to re-send earlier conversations. This feature promises to solve the challenge. According to WhatsApp, when message history is shared, all group members are notified with a clear timestamp and sender details provided, and the history is displayed separately from regular messages.