What you need to know
- WhatsApp has announced a major overhaul of its status updater.
- This change allows you to share voice messages, react to statuses, and see link previews.
- New status updates are also indicated by new profile rings, and new audience selectors give you more control over your privacy.
Since being acquired by Meta (then Facebook) in 2014, WhatsApp has slowly adopted some of the features already available in the social media platform’s app arsenal. In 2017, the service added support for status updates to challenge Snapchat Stories. To make this feature more appealing to users, WhatsApp is currently rolling out a major overhaul to its status updater, making it more in line with Instagram Stories.
Service announced in blog post (opens in new tab) A total of 5 new features will be added to WhatsApp Status, including the ability to share voice messages. You can record a voice note of up to 30 seconds and post it as a status update.
As TechCrunch points out (opens in new tab)WhatsApp is expanding the availability of voice messages beyond chats to include status updates. That’s because more than 7 billion voice messages are sent via chat every day after the feature’s adoption skyrocketed last year. The new feature was first spotted in the beta version of the app early last year.
However, since voice memos are more personal, it can be difficult to share them with everyone on your contact list. That’s why WhatsApp now allows you to limit the visibility of your status updates. You can view your entire contact list, contacts with exceptions, or only selected people. The app will remember your last selected audience and automatically apply it to your next status update.
Before Private Audience Selector, you had to manually change who could see your status in WhatsApp’s settings menu.
Another highly requested feature is the ability to react to statuses with emojis, similar to what Instagram and Facebook already offer. To get started, swipe up on your status and tap one of the 8 emojis, including 😍, 😂, 😮, 😥, 🙏, 👏, 🎉, and 💯.
Your WhatsApp status will also be more prominent when it goes live with your new profile ring. This new look makes your statuses look like Instagram stories. A ring appears around your profile picture in your chat list, group participants list, and contact information page.
Finally, links you share as statuses have a richer look thanks to a new visual preview of their content. This is already possible with links sent as messages, and extending your status with one of the best messaging apps is a logical next step.
WhatsApp has just started rolling out these new features and they will be available to everyone in the coming weeks.
