WhatsApp will let users reserve a username starting today, removing the phone number as the default contact identifier for the first time in the app's history.
The feature, years in the making, begins reservation sign-ups now and rolls out fully later this year. Accounts will still require a phone number to create, but once a username is set, that number no longer needs to be shared to start a conversation. More than three billion users are eligible.
This matters because WhatsApp has long positioned itself as a privacy-first messenger while quietly making your phone number the price of admission for every new contact. A username layer finally closes that gap — your number stays yours even if you talk to strangers, journalists, or anyone else you would rather not hand a direct line to.
Signal has offered phone-number-free contact discovery since 2022, so WhatsApp is playing catch-up here, not pioneering. Whether Meta actually delivers the full rollout on the vague "later this year" timeline is the thing worth watching.