WhatsApp for iPhone updated with Chat notification, Videos Backup, Lower Data Usage and more!

Not to be outdone by rival Viber which rolled out animated stickers, location sharing, a brand new keypad and other enhancements in yesterday’s refresh, Facebook-owned WhatsApp today pushed a substantial update to its App Store application.

WhatsApp for iPhone now features richer notifications settings with per-chat rules and mute options, a new swipe gesture to mark chats as read or unread, the ability to directly share contacts from the Contacts app and locations from Apple Maps, backups for your videos and much more.

Other new features in this update include an enhanced interface when cropping photos and videos before adding them to a chat, friendlier features for hearing-impaired users with improved VoiceOver support and infinite scrolling with earlier messages loading automatically as you scroll chats.

Message swiping and muting

WhatsApp now features the familiar swiping gesture on the chat screen that you can use to reveal hidden options, like in Apple’s Mail and a number of other third-party apps.

For example, swiping in the chat list from left to right lets you mark a message as read. If a message has already been read, you will see the option to mark it as unread.

Swiping in the chat list from right to left lets you archive a message.

If you tap More, a menu pops up offering options to mute the conversation, bring up contact information, share the contents of your chat in an email message, clear the chat without deleting it from your history or delete the chat forever.

For those wondering, you can mute a chat for 8 hours, 1 week or 1 year.

Location sharing from Apple Maps

WhatsApp is now listed as an option in the Share sheet within Apple Maps.

This lets you quickly send your current location, or any point of interest for that matter, directly to WhatsApp without leaving Apple Maps. Just fire up Apple Maps on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad, find a location (or drop a pin on the map) and tap the share icon in the upper right corner.

Now choose WhatsApp in the top row of icons, choose one or more WhatsApp contacts to share the location with and tap Send, as shown above. Which brings me to another new feature in WhatsApp 2.12.5: a larger map thumbnail in the chat window.

Here’s what it looks like.

As you can see, the Fifth Avenue location I just sent to myself from Apple Maps appears in the chat window as a larger map thumbnail. If I tap the embedded thumbnail, WhatsApp takes me to a full-screen map view like before.

Location sharing from Contacts app

In addition to native sharing to WhatsApp from Apple Maps, the same feature is now available in Apple’s stock Contacts app. As you may have suspected, this lets you quickly share specific contact data with a friend on WhatsApp right within the context of the Contacts app.

First, open Contacts on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad and tap on a contact. Scroll down in the contact view screen until you see the Share Contact option. Tap it, choose WhatsApp in the top row of icons, select your recipient and you’ll be taken to a new screen to cherry-pick which contact information you’d like to share.

In the example above, I’m sharing Apple, Inc’s work address and its homepage with myself. Depending on specific contact information shared, WhatsApp will provide additional options in the chat window. In the example above, I can tap on the received Apple Inc. contact card to reveal the homepage and work address I shared with myself.

But if send more contact information from Contacts to WhatsApp like phone number, the embedded contact card in WhatsApp’s chat window will provide buttons to immediately message the contact, save the card as a new contact on my iPhone or add information to one of the existing contacts on my device.

Lower data consumption

Viber’s most recent update brought out a more efficient data compression and WhatsApp follows suit. Just tap on the Settings icon alongside the bottom of the WhatsApp interface to bring up in-app settings. Now tap on Chats and Calls and then flip the Low Data Usage switch to ON.

WhatsApp says enabling the feature “further lowers the amount of data used during a WhatsApp call,” but stops short of saying how many kilobytes are saved during a call with this enabled. Viber, for instance, said its new data compression allows the app to burn just 84 kilobytes per minute to make an audio call on a 2G connection.

WhatsApp’s option that lowers data usage will be of particular importance to users in emerging markets and developing countries who either purchase data on the go in 100-megabyte buckets or their monthly cellular data allowance is below one gigabyte.

Video backups

I like WhatsApp’s built-in backup system that periodically saves my chats and media in the cloud. It gives me a piece of mind knowing that I can restore my chat history on another device in just a few seconds.

Now in WhatsApp 2.12.5, you can at last tell the app to back up videos, too.

To enable video backups, visit the Chats and Calls section in WhatsApp settings, tap on Chat Backup and flip the Include Videos switch to the ON position.

WhatsApp stores your backups in iCloud so it may be a good idea to perform a backup while on Wi-Fi or disable cellular data for iCloud if you really must back up a WhatsApp archive on a cellular connection.

WhatsApp 2.12.5 changelog

The following new features and enhancements are listed in the changelog:

• Per chat custom notification settings and mute
• You can now include videos in your chat backups in Settings > Chats and Calls > Chat Backup
• Mark chats as unread or read with a swipe to the right
• Better support for VoiceOver
• Directly share contacts from the Contacts app and locations from Apple Maps to WhatsApp
• Lower the data usage used during WhatsApp calls in Settings > Chats and Calls
• Earlier messages now load automatically as you scroll chats
• Improved design for cropping photos and videos
• Location messages now use a large map thumbnail

WhatsApp is the leading mobile messaging platform with more than 800 million active monthly users versus Viber’s installed base of 500 million active users.

WhatsApp availability

The 46-megabyte application requires an iPhone, iPod touch or iPad with iOS 6.0 or later. WhatsApp is optimized for native display resolution on the iPhone 5/5c/5c, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, but continues to lack an iPad-optimized interface and a WatchKit component for your wrist.

Source

Apple announces new Records for the App Store, New Years day was its best day ever!

Apple on Thursday announced that the first week of January set a new record for billings from the App Store, with customers around the world spending nearly half a billion dollars on apps and in-app purchases. It also revealed New Year’s Day 2015 marked the single biggest day ever in App Store sales history, as customers presumably used gift cards and took advantage of App Store sales.

“This year is off to a tremendous start after a record-breaking year for the App Store and our developer community,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services. “We’re so proud of the creativity and innovation developers bring to the apps they create for iOS users and that the developer community has now earned over $25 billion.”

Furthermore, Apple announced it had a record-breaking 2014. The Cupertino-based company says billings rose 50 percent and apps generated over $10 billion in revenue for developers. App Store developers have earned a cumulative $25 billion from the sale of apps and games.

Apple launched a new website on Thursday, showing the jobs created by its ecosystem. It says more than one million jobs have been created to support Apple in the US.

Apple also bragged about its help in Global Fund to fight AIDS, saying it donated a $20 million this quarter, and since partnering with (RED) has donated over $100 million.

While there weren’t any new details for Apple Pay, the company reiterated that more banks and credit unions continue to add support for Apple Pay and it now represents about 90 percent of credit card purchase volume in the US.

Google Play Store gets 50% more Downloads compared to Apple’s App Store!

Both the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store did great for the Q2 quarter, besting their results in Q1 by 60% and 45%, respectively.

That gave the Google Play Store, nearly 50% more downloads compared to the iOS App Store. It terms of revenue, however, it’s the Apple repository that still comes ahead.

In fact, it falls very far behind, as the App Store brings 80% more revenue to Apple, than the Play Store does for Google. The good news for Apple continue with a rise in revenue of 45% compared to the previous quarter – in US dollars.

For Google, there’s also an increase of 30%.

 

Untied States, Brazil and India are the top three countries that have downloaded most apps from the Play Store. India in particular, has surged jumping two places up compared to Q1, when it was fifth. Interestingly enough, the US doesn’t bring the most revenue for the Google Play Store. The top market where Android apps are sold most is Japan.

Following it are the United States, South Korea, Germany and Taiwan. Games are the most profitable category from the Play Store with Tools and Communications category close by. AppAnnie suggests that when the Android One program launches, Android will strengthen its presence in emerging markets.

Apple is Officially Signing Deals With New Countries Including Lebanon!

When Phil Schiller introduced the iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c last September at Apple’s HQ, the SVP of Worldwide Marketing proclaimed that Apple would officially partner with over 270 carriers in 100 countries by the year’s end to distribute the iPhone to customers. That trend of expansion has seemingly continued as we saw Russia’s second largest carrier Megafone reestablish a direct relationship with Apple and commit to a three-year deal to purchase and carry the iPhone at the beginning of this year. Now it seems Apple has inked deals with two carriers in Serbia to officially distribute the iPhone in the European nation for the first time.

Mobile Telephony of Serbia, or mt:s, shared via Twitter today that it will become the first mobile carrier in the country to officially carry the iPhone. Mobile Telephony of Serbia isn’t arriving to the iPhone party in Serbia on its own though.

Vip Mobile has shared today that it is positioned to carry the iPhone as soon as the smartphone is certified by RATEL, Serbian’s agency for regulating electronic devices in the nation. Vip Mobile notes that its owner Telekom Austria already supports and markets the iPhone in several other markets adding to the Serbian carrier’s confidence in carrying the iPhone.

While the deals could still possibly be in negotiations with Apple as they’ve been mum on the news, both carriers chose today to share their respective announcements.

Adding to the mix is 500,000 subscriber Canadian carrier Vidéotron which began taking signups on its site for notifications of pending iPhone availability.

@apollozac btw Videotron iPhone launch confirmed for March 28iphoneincanada.ca/carriers/video…

—
Gary Ng (@gary_ng) March 14, 2014

In Serbia, Vip Mobile estimates around 2 million subscribers with about 20% of the marketshare in the nation while mt:s had over 5.5 million customers at last mention in 2008. Back in Canada, Vidéotron shares that it has nearly 500,000 mobile subscribers.

Apple is also signing deals in Lebanon.

Our friend @BernardAzar was right once again, iPhone will be soon officially released in Lebanon by @AlfaTelecom. Stay tuned for the date!

—
Marwan Hayek (@Marwan_Hayek) March 14, 2014

Via: 9to5Mac

Leaked screenshots of Voice calling in WhatsApp’s upcoming iPhone update!

As you know, the world’s most popular mobile messaging software, WhatsApp, is being purchased by the social networking giant Facebook for a staggering $16 billion. WhatsApp previously promised to introduce VoIP calling in the second quarter of this year, a move poised to turn the tables on competition like Viber, now owned by Rakuten.

While Viber last December unveiled a new Skype-like Viber Out feature for making low-cost outgoing calls to international mobile and landline numbers, a set of screenshots leaked on Friday purportedly depicting what WhatsApp’s VoIP calling will look like in its iPhone application, a free download from the App Store…

According to Italian Apple blog iPhoneItalia (Google translate), WhatsApp’s VoIP calling interface is heavily reminiscent of the new-look Phone app in the latest iOS 7.1 update, down to the circular End Call button. When a VoIP call comes in, the app displays your caller’s name, along with their photo and phone number. As the screenies attest, WhatsApp’s in-call features apparently include call-muting, directing the call through the speaker and switching back to a messaging session. Akin to other VoIP calling apps on the App Store, switching to another app while the VoIP session is in progress will prompt iOS to put a colored bar at the top so you can easily switch back to the call with a tap.

Another new feature: a camera button at the top of the keyboard which lets you quickly attach multiple photos to a text message. Sending multiple photos in the current WhatsApp version is a multi-tap affair (photo attachments are hidden behind the More button) so this minor tweak should be welcomed by fans of text messaging.

 

WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum confirmed at Mobile World Congress a month ago that“we’re going to introduce voice on WhatsApp in the second quarter of this year.” iOS and Android editions of WhatsApp will get voice calling first, he said, with Windows Phone and some BlackBerry phones getting the feature at a later stage.

According to The Guardian, VoIP calling between WhatsApp users should be free. Currently, WhatsApp has voicemail and lets you send recorded messages to contacts.

You can download WhatsApp free of charge in the App Store.

Although it got refreshed with iOS 7-friendly look back in December, WhatsApp still supports iPhone and iPod touch devices running – wait for it – iOS 4.3 or later.