WhatsApp has been given until May 2026 to comply with the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA) after its Channels feature exceeded the user threshold that triggers stricter regulatory oversight.
The European Commission confirmed that WhatsApp Channels now averages about 51.7 million monthly active users across the EU, surpassing the DSA’s 45-million-user benchmark. This has led to WhatsApp being added to the EU’s list of Very Large Online Platforms (VLOPs).
The designation applies specifically to Channels, which allows one-to-many broadcasts, and not to WhatsApp’s core end-to-end encrypted private messaging services. Private chats and small group conversations remain outside the scope of the new rules.
What the DSA requires
As a VLOP, WhatsApp will be required to carry out systemic risk assessments and implement measures to mitigate risks linked to illegal content, electoral manipulation, violations of fundamental rights, privacy concerns, and threats to freedom of expression. Its latest DSA transparency report, covering the first half of 2025, showed Channels’ user base comfortably above the regulatory threshold, triggering the enhanced obligations.
The European Commission said Meta must achieve full compliance by late May 2026, warning that non-compliance could attract fines of up to six per cent of Meta’s global annual turnover.
Part of a wider EU tech crackdown
The move is part of the EU’s broader effort to tighten regulation of major technology platforms under the DSA, despite criticism from the United States. The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has previously described aspects of the law as amounting to censorship and unfairly targeting American companies.
WhatsApp is also facing increased scrutiny in Europe, including a December 2025 antitrust investigation into whether Meta’s rollout of AI features breaches competition rules.
More broadly, enforcement has accelerated. The EU recently issued its first DSA fine, imposing a €120 million penalty on Elon Musk’s X for transparency violations, and has opened a new probe into X’s Grok AI tool. Meta’s Facebook and Instagram platforms remain under multiple ongoing DSA investigations.
