Install YOo

YOo runs on iPhone and Android, with a companion app for Mac and Windows. It is free, and there is nothing to pay for inside it.

Where to get it

Installing the direct download

If you install the .apk yourself rather than through Google Play, Android will warn you that the file comes from outside the store and ask you to allow it. That warning is normal, and you should take it seriously everywhere else: only install a file you got from us, over HTTPS, from this website.

We publish a SHA-256 checksum beside every download. If you can, check it before installing — a file whose checksum does not match is not the file we published, and you should not install it.

Direct installs do not update themselves. You will need to come back here for new versions.

Using YOo on a computer

The computer app is a second screen for the phone you already set up. It cannot register a number of its own. You install it, it shows a QR code, and you scan that code from Settings → Linked devices on your phone. Without the phone there is nothing to scan and nothing to use.

From the moment you link them, messages arrive on both. Conversations from before the link stay on the phone — the computer starts at the point you connected it.

Both downloads will warn you the first time. On Windows, choose More info then Run anyway. On a Mac, macOS will say it cannot check the app — right-click (or Control-click) YOo in your Applications folder, choose Open, then confirm. Each is a one-off, and both warnings mean the same thing: the app is not yet registered with the platform, not that anything is wrong with it. Only ever install a copy you got from this website, over HTTPS.

Setting up

1. Open YOo and enter your phone number in full international form.
2. Complete the short check that confirms you are a person.
3. Read the six-digit code from the WhatsApp message and enter it.
4. Choose the name and photo other people will see. Both are encrypted.

If the code does not arrive, the questions page covers the usual reasons.

Before you rely on it

There is no backup. YOo has no PIN and keeps no copy of your messages. If you lose your phone, the conversations on it are gone. This is a deliberate trade: we cannot lose what we never held, but neither can we give it back. The privacy policy explains what we do and do not keep.