WhatsApp is the world’s most popular third-party chatting client and had 1.5billion active monthly users as of October last year.
That means the app surpasses rivals such as Facebook Messenger, WeChat and Skype in terms of user numbers.
One of the software’s most popular features is the ability to forward messages to friends and family.
If the user has received a message, they are able to highlight it and send it on to others with the tap of a button.
The feature is incredibly useful for those that want to share videos and images quickly.
Last year WhatsApp made a huge alteration of the feature by alerting users to messages that had been forwarded.
Previously, fans were unable to differentiate between a message that had been written by a user and one that had been forwarded.
The WhatsApp faithful used to be able to forward a particular message to 20 people or groups, however the firm has announced a new change to the feature.
From today, WhatsApp users are now only able to forward a message to five individuals or groups.
The chatting client announced the alteration today and said it was made in a bid to quell “misinformation and rumours”.
Explaining the change further, Victoria Grand, vice president for policy and communications at WhatsApp, said: “We’re imposing a limit of five messages all over the world as of today.”
WhatsApp imposed a forwarding limit of five messages in India back in July last year.
The decision was taken after such texts led to several acts of violence in the region.
However, the new announcement represents a global expansion of the initiative.
Although WhatsApp has said the change has been put in place from today, Express.co.uk was still able to forward messages to more than five people in our testing.
That means WhatsApp may be planning to implement the alteration for Android and iOS in the coming hours.