Following in the footsteps of the 3310 re-release, HMD Global — the company that now makes phones under the Nokia brand — revealed an updated version of its much-loved 8110 at Mobile World Congress last year. Now called the 8110 4G, the device sports the iconic bendy shape and a few features that elevate it slightly above feature phone status, without quite getting it to smartphone standing. But one of the key things it’s been missing is WhatsApp… until now.
HMD Global announced today that the Facebook-owned messaging app is now available to download from the KaiOS Store for the retro handset.
“Millions of people stay in touch with their loved ones through messaging apps like WhatsApp, and we wanted to bring this to fans of our retro classic, the Nokia 8110. Now, you can keep up to date on your family and friends’ groups, share messages and never miss a moment, all with the style and cool-factor of a true Nokia classic,” says Shaun Durandt, general manager of HMD Global Southern Africa.
The Nokia 8110 4G runs on KaiOS, a mobile operating system developed specifically for feature phones. It also comes with a range of preloaded Google apps like Google Assistant, Google Maps and Google Search as well as popular apps like Facebook.
You can go properly bananas with the Banana Yellow colour variant, or the more subdued black if it’s more your vibe. Good luck typing messages on the numpad like it’s 2003, though. Hope you’ve still got the muscle memory from the days of T9 predictive. If not, we’re sure it’ll come back fast enough.
