Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- WhatsApp could soon introduce bill payments in India, taking on rivals like PhonePe and Google Pay.
- We discovered the upcoming feature in an APK teardown of WhatsApp beta version 2.25.3.15.
- It’s unclear when the bill payment system will roll out on WhatsApp in India, but it could allow users to pay dues across multiple categories.
The next big thing for WhatsApp users in the platform’s largest market — India — could be bill payments, according to an APK teardown conducted by Android Authority.
We’ve found references to a new bill payment feature in WhatsApp’s beta version 2.25.3.15, indicating that Meta is gearing up to expand its financial services in India.
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An APK teardown helps predict features that may arrive on a service in the future based on work-in-progress code. However, it is possible that such predicted features may not make it to a public release.
Currently, WhatsApp allows users in India to send money to contacts and make payments to businesses via UPI (Unified Payments Interface). We’ve now discovered that the platform could soon enable users to pay various bills directly within the app. Data retrieved from the beta version lists the following bill payment categories:
- Electricity bills
- Mobile prepaid recharges
- LPG gas payments
- Water bills
- Landline postpaid bills
- Rent payments
AssembleDebug / Android Authority
While the feature is still in development, an empty activity for bill payments has already been added in the latest beta version of the app. You can see the screenshot for the same above.
A timely move for WhatsApp
Android Authority’s discovery comes just a month after India’s National Payments Corporation (NPCI) lifted the cap on WhatsApp Pay’s user onboarding.
Previously, WhatsApp Pay could only add users in a phased manner, limiting its ability to scale up. With the restriction now removed, Meta can expand WhatsApp Pay to all of India’s 532 million users, allowing it to directly compete with market leaders like PhonePe and Google Pay.
India is WhatsApp’s largest market, and introducing bill payments could be a game-changer for Meta. However, since we discovered this in an APK teardown, we will have to wait and watch when the platform rolls out these services. There may still be some regulatory or logistical hurdles WhatsApp has to overcome before it can introduce the new feature in the country.
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