Last few months have been quite good for WhatsApp. The
Facebook owned company has been in limelight much more than ever before,
for all the right reasons – they launched a desktop client, they
launched voice calling feature on Android, then they brought it to other
platforms like iOS and BB10, and most recently they launched a beta
version of WhatsApp on their official website with Material Design
makeover. But as you know, it was a beta app made available only for
testing purposes.
But finally the wait is over. WhatsApp Team has officially rolled out
a new version of its app via Play Store, which finally makes WhatsApp with Material Design UI available to all Android users who use the service on a Lollipop based smartphone.
While new version released in Play Store (2.12.87) isn’t radically
different in terms of UI from the beta version (2.12.38), it fixes
several annoyances that were associated with the beta app. For example:
1. The default wallpaper has been updated to a decent one. It looks
calmer and better to the eyes, and it also sits nicely with the overall
new design of app.
2. The calling interface has been materialized completely.
3. UI of search bar has also been cleaned up.
4. Gingerbread icons that used to appear in More menu have finally been replaced, and so on…
If these small changes are kept aside, no other major change has been done to the app. Functionality remains almost same as that of beta app and you can still find all the options in same place. Major new additions done to the app are given below:
A. The very first thing that you’ll notice in new app is a whole lot of new icons, animations and a colorful emoji tray. For example, there’s an animation when you click on an image inside the app or try to share it. Attachment icons have also been made bigger and more colorful with this update.
B. Second thing that you’ll notice after updating the app is its task
bar. Calls bar, Chats and Contacts all have been merged together to
create this dark green bar, which sits atop everything else inside the
app.
C. But the biggest and most visible change affects calling feature. In
beta app a slightly more pronounced bright green WhatsApp Call bar used
to appear below the name of caller. That is no longer the case. New app
has been designed with company’s trademark dark green color in the
background and focus has remained mainly on highlighting the name of
caller with bigger font. To do so company decided to trash that bright
green WhatsApp Call bar too. You can see the change below. On the left
it’s old design and on the right it’s new material design :
There are several other subtle changes as well, but overall this new
app looks great. Update it now and do let us know your thoughts about it
in the comments section below.
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