• WhatsApp Channels has officially rolled out in South Africa, with users now able to receive updates from their favourite organisations and creators.
• You can now follow Channels from the new “updates” menu.
• WhatsApp says that it will soon let any user make a Channel.

After launching to 150 countries last week, WhatsApp Channels – a new way to follow content creators and organisations – arrived in South Africa on the weekend.

South African WhatsAppers would have noticed that the “Status” menu has been changed to “Updates” and below all the statuses from your contacts will be the Channels tab.

Channels, initially launched by the Meta-owned chat platform in June provides a chat-like feed for you to follow certain accounts.

This feed cannot be interactive with other than two react with emojis to posts. These can be images, text and video. The entire process is similar to Telegram’s chat feeds, where users can join a channel and receive content without necessarily being able to interact with it.

Meta did not indicate what countries received the Channels update before others last week when it saw a wider global launch to 150 countries. By the time we covered the wider launch, Channels was still not available locally. It seems it took the platform a few days to get in line.

Meta saws that it has made it easy to find Channels that are based on your region through an enhanced directory feature. Local Channels will be recommended first, followed by which are most active, most popular and then new channels.

When you follow a Channel, updates or posts that are made on it will notify you as if a normal chat. Then you can simply go to the Channel in your Updates tab to check out all the new goings on. You can also forward these updates to chats or groups. These forwards will include a back link so that others can also follow the same Channels.

Right now only organisations and content creators can make Channels, but WhatsApp is planning to soon allow anyone to make a Channel.

“This is just the beginning, and we’ll continue to add more features and expand Channels based on feedback we get from users. Over the coming months, we’ll also make it possible for anyone to create a channel,” the company said.

There aren’t that many Channels as of yet, but there are certainly a few worth following for the latest updates.

Here are a few WhatsApp Channels we recommend:

• Mark Zuckerberg

The Meta founder and CEO was among the first people to launch a Channel. Here you can see the Zuck in his full glory, giving updates about the ongoing state of his company, and all their social media platforms. This is currently among the most followed Channels on WhatsApp with over 2 million.

• WWE

Another Channel with a huge amount of followers is entertainment juggernaut WWE. The company uses the Channel to keep users abreast of all the latest matches, and behind-the-scenes goings on in the world of professional wrestling.

• World Health Organisation

The World Health Organisaton (WHO) has a WhatsApp Channel. Yes you read this right. The organisation provides easy to follow posts, threads and even provides links where you can find information on a number of topics that relate to living more healthily.

For example, did you know that yesterday was World Patient Safety Day?

• Sony Pictures

Are you a person who enjoys movies? Probably. Then why not get some updates from one of Hollywood’s biggest production companies. Sony Pictures’ WhatsApp Channel shows off the latest trailers, the latest films and even some trivia from favourite movies like Easy A.

• Call of Duty

The largest gaming-related Channel currently on WhatsApp revolves around Call of Duty. If you are a fan of the games and want the latest updates from Activision’s inescapable first-person shooter staple then this Channel is one to follow.

Here Call of Duty’s marketing and social media team will update with whole videos on new feature for upcoming games, and all the latest from the series.

• Bloomberg News

If we had a Channel we’d say follow that for news, but since we don’t, we recommend Bloomberg for all the latest insights and headlines from across the globe. You can read highlights from news stories and then follow links to Bloomberg’s site to read the rest. For example, did you know that Messi splurged on an $11 million waterfront mansion in Florida?