WeChat, the China-built cross-platform messaging app, has been updated to version 5.0 on Apple’s App Store. Meanwhile, its Android counterpart still carries version 4.6.1 on Google Play Store.
The major update brings several new enhancements and features. Among them is the introduction of a sticker shop with online payment capability which allows users to download and pay for stickers.
WeChat 5.0 also introduces “Hold Together”, a location based service that allows users to further find and connect friends who are close to each other. Along with functions like “Shake” and “People Nearby” (previously called “Look Around”), users are able to connect with friends with a simple touch of the screen. Once friends have been located, you can easily add friends with an upgraded “Adding Contacts’” function. Moreover, communicating with them is made simpler with a refined “Quick Entry” for the Group Chat function.
In addition to that, WeChat makes sharing web pages to Facebook easier for those who have linked their Facebook account to their WeChat account, a revamped “Official Accounts” user interface that makes it more convenient for users to group brand accounts into one single category reducing clutter in chat screens and finally a new “Save Messages” allows users to keep sentimental text and voice messages and photos.
WeChat 5.0 for iOS is free for download and is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch and Apple iPad running iOS 4.3 or later. Android devices will receive the update later.
For more details, refer to the press release below.
WeChat Announces Major Upgrades
WeChat 5.0 introduces a sticker shop with online payment
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – August 5, 2013 – WeChat today announced the launch of WeChat 5.0 to further enrich the user experience. As WeChat continues to grow on the international stage with its recent announcement that they passed 70 million registered user accounts internationally, the platform continues to innovate and bring new features to meet customer needs.
With the WeChat 5.0 comes the introduction of the Sticker Shop which is supported by online payment allows users to download and pay for stickers via the platform.
Also new with the WeChat 5.0 is the ‘Hold Together,’ a location based service that allows users to further find and connect friends who are close to each other. Along with ‘Shake’ and ‘People Nearby’ (previously called “Look Around”), users are able to connect with friends with just a simple touch of the screen. WeChat has also made it easier to add friends with their upgraded ‘Adding Contacts’ function, as well as made communicating with them simpler with a refined ‘Quick Entry’ for the group chat function.
“The new WeChat 5.0 moves the platform beyond a simple chatting app and enriches the user experience by being a truly mobile social platform. Users not only meet, chat and share moments, pictures and videos with friends and people they care about in an innovative and fun way, they do it in a dynamic and intuitive fashion,” said Poshu Yeung, Vice President at International Business Group at Tencent, the company behind the WeChat app.
In addition, other platform updates include
• Making sharing web pages to Facebook easier for those who have linked their Facebook account to their WeChat.
• A revamped ‘Official Accounts’ user interface making it more convenient for users to group brand accounts into one single category reducing clutter in chat screens.
• A new ‘Save Messages’ function allows users to keep sentimental text and voice messages and photos.
“While WeChat users enjoy connecting with friends and meeting new people; WeChat’s comprehensive privacy setting functionality allows users to limit and control who is able to communicate with them, view their information and manage how they can be found. For added security and control, protection mechanisms such as the two-way authentication to initiate a chat, ability to hide contact details and create a ‘black list’ to block other users and allowing users to turn off LBS features, means their fun is experienced only with people they trust,” continued Mr. Yeung.
Connecting people in an innovative way, WeChat became the most downloaded mobile social app on App Store in July in numerous countries including the Philippines, Argentina, Brazil, Hong Kong, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Spain, South Africa, Thailand, Turkey and United Arab Emirates.
WeChat 5.0 for iOS is now available for download. WeChat 5.0 for Android will be available at a later date. For further details, please visit www.wechat.com
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