WhatsApp 2018: Five features to be rolled out soon

WhatsApp has been on a roll, leaving no stone unturned in a bid to keep increasing the user engagement by providing them more tools to easily manage it. The Facebook-owned company has recently added features that are not only available for one-on-one conversations but also for group chats.

Features such as High Priority notifications, Dismiss as Admin, double stickers, re-downloading three-months-old photos and videos were recently spotted in WhatsApp beta version. The company keeps on adding a plethora of features to enhance its user's experience. Here are five features that WhatsApp might roll out in 2018.

High Priority notification: The feature which is available only for Android beta users, allows managing their notifications in a better way. Users can pin high-priority notifications to the top of a smartphone’s notification centre. Moreover, the High Priority Notifications feature can be located in the notifications setting. Do note that, if your smartphone has other applications that have a similar feature, then the notifications should be displayed in a chronological order. This feature is available in the WhatsApp version 2.18.117 on Android.

Re-download old images and videos: WhatsApp for Android beta version 2.18.113 supports this feature, and it is currently not available on iOS. With this feature, users will be able to re-download deleted media from their servers again that might have been deleted. According to WABetaInfo, media files that were sent as long as three months back can be re-downloaded.

Additionally, WABetaInfo asserted that "Since a few days, WhatsApp allows downloading deleted media from their servers again. This automatically translates into the fact that WhatsApp continues to store our media on their servers also after downloading them." Notably, even with the files stored on their server, the instant messaging app keeps the data secure, as per the cited source.

WhatsApp Payments ‘Request Money’: This feature is currently available to few select users who have WhatsApp Payments enabled. The Request Money feature is on WhatsApp beta for Android 2.18.113. So far one was allowed sending payments to the contacts via UPI address, QR code, however, with the new Request Money feature, users can request money from their friends.

Dismiss as Admin feature: WhatsApp has added the ‘Dismiss as Admin’ feature, aimed at the WhatsApp groups. Spotted by WABetaInfo, this new feature will allow one group administrator to demote other admins without even deleting the person from the group. Previously, group admins had to remove others admins in order to demote them. Currently, the new feature is only available to iOS beta users on WhatsApp version 2.18.41 and Web apps. However, it is not yet thrown open on the stable version of the Android app.

Lock voice message recording: The instant messaging service has recently added this feature to the Android beta version 2.18.102. This feature is also available on iOS. With this new update, one will not be required to hold down the mic button for as long as one is recording a voice message. One just needs to tap and hold the mic icon for 0.5 seconds and then swipe it up till the lock symbol shows on the screen. It will then automatically record the voice message without keeping the mic button pressed continuously.

Besides, there remain a few features that WhatsApp should offer which its relatively ‘unpopular’ rivals do such as Schedule WhatsApp messages, sharing files up to 1GB and others.

Schedule WhatsApp messages: While WhatsApp allows you to send your messages, photos and videos, instantly, there are times when you want your message to be delivered at just the right time. Sadly, WhatsApp doesn’t offer an option to schedule your messages. This features should hopefully come soon.

However, for now, users can use the SKEDit app to schedule WhatsApp messages, text messages, send automatic emails, schedule Facebook posts and set call reminders, without having to lift a finger! With this app, one can create and schedule a post or a message. SKEDit will automate sharing or message without further user action. One can also set a scheduled reminder instead of an automatic submission.

Sharing files up to 1GB: WhatsApp adds several features on a nearly regular basis, however, the only feature that the messaging platform restricts — is the limited file size of attachments. While there are some messaging apps that let you share over 1GB of data, WhatsApp lets you share 100MB of data on Android and 120MB data on iOS devices. With all the updates that WhatsApp is receiving, this feature is expected to debut soon.

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