WhatsApp is hands down, the most popular instant messaging application out there. Billions of people use the app in their daily lives constantly to communicate with friends, family and work and chances are while you are reading this, some messages are popping up on your WhatsApp right now. Now, in the past few years, WhatsApp has drastically changed ever since the control of the application went into the hands of the parent company, Facebook. Facebook, has since then, introduced so many new features that the WhatsApp looks nothing like before and has functionalities which the users enjoy. But, there is no stopping on the front of new updates, the new updates are piling up on WhatsApp, week after week, while there could be a certain waiting time involved for dark mode on WhatsApp, there are others features out there which are making their way to the instant messaging application. Here we detail some of the new features of WhatsApp, which you must be aware of.
Fingerprint Lock
There are a lot of security features when it comes to protecting your phone, ranging from fingerprint, face-unlock, a password and more. However, when it comes to WhatsApp alone, the company was not providing a way to the Android users to individually protect their WhatsApp chat and privacy in case someone were to get hands on their phone. However, a while back, a feature was introduced on WhatsApp iOS which allowed the users to lock their WhatsApp application with fingerprint and biometric, thus restricting users from breaking into someone else’s WhatsApp. Now, this feature will be making its way to Android WhatsApp as well. It is worth noting that other messaging applications like Hike and Telegram offer a secret chat feature which allows the users to keep their chats private, but WhatsApp did not have any such feature, however, it will change soon.
Group Invite With Better Control
One of the most annoying experiences of a WhatsApp user is being added to a group without permission. To control this, WhatsApp had introduced an option to the users to allow their contacts to add them to group only, or nobody. But, now with a new feature, WhatsApp has given a “my contacts except..” Option as well, which will allow the users to customise who will be able to add them to the group. This gives more control to the WhatsApp users.
Netflix in PiP Mode
Many will agree on the fact that Netflix and WhatsApp do not go well together. But, WhatsApp has made a small step to change this as the beta users in the iOS version of WhatsApp will be able to stream Netflix trailers inside the app in picture-in-picture. Currently, videos from Facebook, Instagram and YouTube can be streamed on WhatsApp in PiP. But, with this new update, Netflix trailers will also be streamed in PiP on WhatsApp. This feature is currently not available for the stable version of WhatsApp.
Dark Mode
There is, of course, the much-awaited dark mode which will be coming soon to WhatsApp. This mode will soften the colours on the app and blacken the background so that the users experience less strain on their eyes. The mode will also increase the battery life by a bit on phones with OLED screens.
Boomerang Feature in iOS
Boomerang has been one of the most popular features of Instagram. People use Boomerang to create funny GIFs and clips which they can then share on Social Media. However, many users had to export the GIF from Instagram to upload on their WhatsApp status, or to share with their contacts, but this hassle will be reduced as WhatsApp has introduced the Boomerang feature inside the iOS version of WhatsApp only.
