Communication via SMS has taken a dive, no thanks to instant messaging service like WhatsApp. Now the Facebook acquired messaging service aims to take on the voice segment with its own VOIP (Voice over IP) feature. This has been rumoured for quite sometime now but its leaked screenshots indicate that it could be rolled out very soon.
From the latest images, the calling feature is well integrated into its current interface and the call log would also appear within the chat history itself. What’s unconfirmed right now is whether they would offer paid voice calls to actual phone numbers like Skype and Viber. Since WhatsApp is a free instant messaging, it could be limited to WhatsApp enabled phone numbers during its initial release.
As long as you’re on a generous internet data plan or have easy access to WiFi hotspot, this could potentially disrupt voice usage like how it did to SMS. The developers at WhatsApp appear to be on a roll ever since they introduced their hotly-debated blue ticks. They recently announced a much secured end to end encryption for Android users and a web version is said to be in the pipeline as well.
Check out the additional WhatsApp Voice screenshots after the break.
