Back in early March, it emerged that WhatsApp would be launching a subscription service, and today this has been confirmed as real. WhatsApp is officially testing WhatsApp Plus. This costs €2.49 per month in Europe, PKR 229 per month in Pakistan, and MXN 29 per month in Mexico.
If you subscribe, you get access to exclusive premium stickers, the ability to change your app theme by choosing among 18 colors, and even choose a custom icon for WhatsApp itself – this will be shown on your phone’s home screen and in its app drawer.
WhatsApp Plus features: stickers, themes, icons
You can also pin up to 20 chats with WhatsApp Plus, for easier access (this is up from the limit of 3 that you get if you’re not a subscriber). Additionally, you get access to 10 exclusive premium ringtones, and you can apply some settings in bulk to multiple chats and groups that you’ve added to a specific custom list.
For example, you can set a theme to apply to all conversations within a specific list, and when you add a new conversation to that list, the theme will be automatically applied to it too.
WhatsApp Plus features: pinning, ringtones, lists
WhatsApp Plus is currently available to a limited number of users only, as it is still in testing. It will undoubtedly expand its reach soon. The paid plan seems to be focused on Android at the moment, with support for WhatsApp for iOS planned for later. All of the basic WhatsApp features remain free, including end-to-end encryption. WhatsApp hasn’t removed any core features and added them to the paid plan – all of the Plus features are new.
