WhatsApp's business subscription service gets a name, features in new leak

Whatsapp Message Hero (Image credit: Luke Filipowicz / iMore)

What you need to know

WhatsApp Premium is a new subscription service that will be aimed at businesses.
Businesses will be able to use up to ten devices on a single account.
Businesses that sign up will get their own custom URL.

WhatsApp Business is getting a new subscription offering, according to reports. It'll be called WhatsApp Premium, but it'll be optional and only available to business account holders.

We'd already heard suggestions that a new subscription model was coming but now WABetaInfo has more details. Those details don't include a release window or a price, but we do know that businesses will be able to link up to ten devices to a single WhatsApp Premium account. Those devices can also be given names, too.

Perhaps most interesting is new support for a special account URL, allowing businesses to give people quick and easy access to their WhatsApp account for support and more. Those links will take the form of a wa.me/businessname address.

As you can see in this screenshot, WhatsApp Premium will offer to users the ability to link and name up to 10 devices, so business devices can be also renamed to remember them easily. In addition, WhatsApp is also planning to offer the ability to create a unique custom business link: businesses can already use short links to let customers contact them by opening a link that includes their phone number, but WhatsApp Premium will let business accounts create a custom link, for example, wa.me/wabetainfo! Note that this does not mean that the business phone number is hidden: a custom business link is only a better way to contact the business by using an easy-to-remember link. It is not a username but it is unique, so the custom short link will always open a specific business chat.

Whatsapp Business Premium Screenshots (Image credit: WABetaInfo)

The screenshots above are for the Android version of WhatsApp, but the feature will be available across all platforms once it launches.

WhatsApp is one of the best ways for businesses to stay in touch with their customers and improvements like this will give them more opportunities to do that. WhatsApp is also one of the best iPhone apps for individuals who want to stay in touch with their Android-toting friends and family, too. If they're already using the app, getting customer support via it makes plenty of sense for them.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.