WhatsApp Web doesn’t support Vivaldi browser, here is how you can make it work in Vivaldi again

Beginning from its launch, WhatsApp Web never officially supported Vivaldi browser, Vivaldi has to spoof it as Chrome for the website to work, recent Vivaldi 2.5 update broke that spoofing and now users seeing WhatsApp requires Google Chrome 36+ message when visited. Vivaldi team plans to fix this in a future update.

If you now visit WhatsApp Web in latest Vivaldi browser 2.5 based on Chrome 74, WhatsApp says, its web version works with Google Chrome 36+ and to use its service, it suggests to update Chrome or use Mozilla Firefox or Safari or Microsoft Edge or Opera browser.

We witnessed Google giving the same treatment to Vivaldi in the past for Google Drive by showing unsupported browser message, WhatsApp has been doing this for a while now for Vivaldi and this is not new.

whatapp web showing works with Google Chrome 36+ in Vivaldi

Until Vivaldi team releases an update to fix this, you can use the below workaround to use WhatsApp Web site like before in Vivaldi browser.

Make WhatsApp Web work in Vivaldi 2.5 update

1. Launch Vivaldi browser, visit Chrome Web Store and install User-Agent Switcher Single Click extension

2. Once the extension configuration page opens

3. Head to Vivaldi://about and copy User Agent (ensure you don’t select Vivaldi part at the end) paste in the extension configuration page and click “Save”.

User-Agent Switcher Single click configuration page-min

For instance, Vivaldi 2.5 user agent installed on Windows 10 looks like below, you need to remove Vivaldi /2.5.1525.40 part from the path and paste the remaining in the configuration page.

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/74.0.3729.134 Safari/537.36 Vivaldi/2.5.1525.40

4. Now click on V menu, Tools > Extensions > User-Agent Switcher Single Click > Details

5. Under Site access, choose on Specific sites, add web.whatsapp.com and click Add, done.

make site specific spoofing in Vivaldi

6. Now Visit WhatsApp Web and click extension’s mustache icon on the toolbar to see it going red, reload the website to see WhatsApp working as websites now sees Vivaldi as Chrome browser, that’s because we have changed the user agent.

WhatsApp Web working in Vivaldi again

UPDATE May 16, 2019: Vivaldi realeased a minor update 2.5. 1525.43 to fix WhatsApp Web issue, the spoofing is now working again, if WhatsApp blocks Vivaldi again, you can use the above method.

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Venkat Eswarlu

Venkat is an independent technology journalist and the founder of Techdows. He has been covering web browsers, Windows, and software news since 2009. His exclusive scoops on Chrome, Firefox, and Edge features have been cited by Forbes, TechCrunch, Wired, CNET, and other major publications.

14 Comments

  1. Anonymous

    Tested just now. The extension works (checked with phpinfo), but Whatsapp still doesn’t work. I deleted the cache and cookies via the lock in front of the address bar, reloaded Whatsapp page. Now it works fine! So, please instruct to clear the cache also. 🙂

  2. Anonymous

    After clicking the extension icon, reloading WhatsApp tab just works. I am not sure why other commenters finding not working.

  3. Anonymous

    It’s working, thanks!
    For those not working, try force refresh (Ctrl + F5). Also don’t forget to remove ” Vivaldi/2.5.1525.40″ from the user agent string when saving the configuration inside the extension.

  4. Anonymous

    In the latest Vivaldi, you don’t need to change user agent, Vivaldi does that for you automatically, they’ve fixed that issue actually.

  5. Anonymous

    You can use the extension “User-Agent Switcher for Chrome”, when you install it, just left click in the new icon and select “Chrome > default” . It worked for me, when i did that, i opened the wpp web and uninstall the extension.
    I hope it helps you guys

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