WhatsApp's new colorless design

 WhatsApp's new colorless design is rolling out for Android beta testers 

WhatsApp has been working on a new interface for its Android app. It has now started rolling out the revamped UI to select beta testers. The redesigned WhatsApp UI has new icons, and the colour background has also changed. WhatsApp now looks more minimalist and cleaner too. Following are the some of the important points:-

Meta developers have caught up to WhatsApp rivals with key features like Communities and status updates.

Recent UI changes focus more on aesthetics, with a white top bar now visible to match the bottom navigation bar.

WhatsApp’s new UI is now available to select beta testers on Android.

The WhatsApp redesign has been in the works for months now.

Improved beta features, like the new top bar design, should roll out to stable channel users soon.

Pale white is the new green.

WhatsApp has been a leader in the messaging space for around a decade now. We often remark how it lacks features which apps like Telegram and Signal have supported for far longer, but in the last year, Meta developers have picked up the pace significantly, catching up with additions including Communities, broadcast channels and feature-rich status updates. Now, we are seeing UI changes rolling out to beta testers after months of testing, suggesting WhatsApp wants to improve visual catch-up as well.

The new interface is available with WhatsApp beta update. WhatsApp has started rolling it out to select beta testers but it should be available to more users in the near future. If you’re enrolled in WhatsApp’s beta programme you can update the app to the latest version, and check if you’ve received it. The new interface is available to WhatsApp Business beta users as well. WhatsApp hasn’t updated its UI too often, and most updates focus on making space for new features. However, recent updates like the transition to the swipe able bottom navigation bar seem to focus on the aesthetics more than functionality. Meta had been testing a bottom tab bar for a little over a year before finally giving stable channel users a taste of the new design.

When the new bottom bar rolled out on the stable channel, we were disappointed to find the new omnipresent search bar was obscured by the app’s green top bar with icons on the right and the white WhatsApp logo on the left. However, on beta version 2.24.6.77, which isn’t the latest one, the top bar turned white, making the search field clearly visible. The top bar now featured WhatsApp branding in green on the left-hand side, with the camera shortcut and three-dot overflow menu button still right-aligned like before. This change helps the top and bottom bars look like cohesive UI components, sharing the background colour with the chat list background.

In the new WhatsApp interface, you’ll see that WhatsApp has removed the top green banner. There’s only one uniform colour for both the dark and light theme. So in the light theme, the app background colour is just white, and in the dark theme it’s black with a dark shade of grey on top and bottom. This is similar to the WhatsApp iOS version. With the white background, only WhatsApp can be seen in green colour, and that too with a different font. The iconic green colour is also slightly changed for the icons. It’s a lighter shade than the current green that’s predominant in the app. There’s also a revamped chat bubble colour and the floating action in the dark theme.

WhatsApp is rolling out this change widely, at least to beta testers. Older beta features like icons in the overflow menu are available consistently now. Since the new bottom bar design is already public, you could see the new top bar design in the stable channel soon, completing the transition. The overall look of WhatsApp isn’t very drastic as the placement of icons is still the same but it looks much sleeker now. There’s no word on when WhatsApp will roll out the new interface to all users.