WhatsApp Update – Meta has launched some new additional features for the Windows version of WhatsApp, enabling users to:
- Share and display Status updates
- Access and Follow Channels
- Engage effortlessly in Communities
Technically, this rolls out feature equality with WhatsApp for mobile device users. In reality, though, the change has sparked outrage among Windows users.
What Happened Under the Hood
“The most significant change is one of perspective, and this is not necessarily visible
Meta has stopped the Windows app for WhatsApp and switched to a web app running in a WebView environment.
This means that the new WhatsApp for Windows is basically:
- A web page hosted within an app shell
- A web page hosted within an
Based on browser technology instead of Windows APIs
Why Users Are Angry
According to various reports, the following are results of the recent implementation:
- Considerably more RAM is being used (up to ~1GB in certain instances)
- Lower speed than that of the former native application
- Less efficiency in low and mid-range systems
People who were using the lightweight native client are now being logged out and compelled to shift to the other version that uses WebView, causing a lot of frustration in the tech communities.
The Trade-Off Meta Is Making
In switching to a WebView wrapper, Meta benefits:
- Faster feature releases on platforms
- A common code base
- Easier Maintenance and Upgrades
But the price tag there is:
- Poorer performance on Windows
- Higher resource consumption
The Bigger Picture
This is exactly the sort of trend that the industry is witnessing. Many companies have decided that speed on multiple platforms is worth more to them than the capability to perform natively on Windows.
The addition of Status, Channels, and Communities might please the masses,” Simon Reed said on Platformer, “But the sacrifice of the real Windows experience on the alter of Meta’s desktop application efficiency has left me wondering about the long-term vision of the parent company But the version on Windows has never been more powerful than it is now – and also never more resource-hungry, sluggish, and hated.
