7
We all use WhatsApp daily, often without realising the wealth of features hidden just beneath the surface. While keeping up with new additions can feel like a full-time job, uncovering these useful WhatsApp tricks can genuinely streamline how you communicate and enhance your privacy. I’ve been digging through the latest updates and overlooked settings to bring you a comprehensive list.
Here’s a look at some brilliant tips and tricks I’ve found that you might not know about.
Chat Management & Messaging Mastery
Let’s start with how you can tweak your actual conversations and the messages within them.
- Edit Sent Messages: Made a typo or sent something you immediately regret? You can now edit a message within 15 minutes of sending it. Simply tap and hold the message, select the edit option, make your changes, and tap send.
- Format Your Text: Beyond plain text, WhatsApp offers several formatting options to make your messages stand out. You can make text bold by putting asterisks around it (text), italic with underscores (text), or strikethrough with tildes (
text). You can also use monospace text by adding three backticks (text), create bulleted or numbered lists, and quote parts of messages using an angle bracket (>). On some devices, you can access formatting by selecting the text and tapping options like a three-dot menu.
- Experiment with Custom Fonts: While WhatsApp’s built-in formatting is useful, you can explore third-party apps or even some emoji keyboards to use more unique fonts by generating text with Unicode characters.
- Send Voice and Video Messages: If typing feels like too much effort, easily send voice messages by holding the microphone icon, or switch to the video icon to send short video messages.
- Speed Up Voice Message Playback: Received a long voice note? You can increase the playback speed to 1.5x or 2x without distorting the speaker’s voice.
- Send Messages with Your Voice (Outside the App): For hands-free messaging, you can use your phone’s assistant (Siri on iOS, Google Assistant on Android) to dictate and send WhatsApp messages without opening the app.
- Create and Send Polls: In a group chat, you can easily create a poll to get opinions on things like trip locations or meeting times. Tap the attachment icon (paperclip or ‘+’) and select ‘Poll’.
- Scan and Send Documents: WhatsApp allows you to scan documents directly using your phone’s camera and send them as PDFs within a chat, eliminating the need for a separate scanning app.
- Create and Send GIFs: Access a library of GIFs powered by Tenor directly within WhatsApp. Tap the ‘+’ or paperclip icon, go to Photos & Videos, and look for the GIF option.
- Make Your Own Stickers and Avatars: Personalise your chats by creating stickers of yourself or others from photos. You can also create a custom avatar and use it for stickers or your profile picture.
- Draw on Photos: Before sending a photo, use the built-in editing tools to add doodles, text, or emojis.
- Quote and Reply: To add context in a busy chat, you can reply directly to a specific message, which will show the original message above your response. On iOS, swipe right on the message; on Android, tap and hold and select ‘Reply’.
- Reply Privately to Group Messages: If you want to respond to a message from a group member privately, you can do so directly from the group chat. Tap and hold the message and select ‘Reply Privately’ from the options.
- Pin Important Chats: Keep frequently used individual or group chats at the top of your chat list by pinning them.
- Mark as Unread: If you’ve read a message but need a reminder to reply later, you can mark the chat as unread.
- Archive Chats: Declutter your main chat list without deleting conversations by archiving them. Archived chats are accessible from the top of your chat screen.
- Star Important Messages: Bookmark messages containing crucial information like addresses, dates, or recommendations by starring them. Starred messages are easily found in the contact or group info menu.
- Search Within Chats: Quickly find specific information by searching through all your chats or within a particular conversation.
- Export Chats: Save a copy of an entire conversation, with or without media, which you can save or send elsewhere.
- Delete Specific Messages: You can delete messages for yourself or, within a limited time frame (around two days), delete them for everyone in the chat.
Privacy & Security
Protecting your conversations and personal information on WhatsApp is crucial.
- Disappearing Messages and View Once: Enhance privacy by setting messages to automatically disappear after a set time (24 hours, 7 days, or 90 days). You can also send photos or videos that can only be viewed once before they disappear from the chat.
- Lock the WhatsApp App: Add an extra layer of security by requiring your fingerprint (Android) or Touch ID/Face ID (iOS) to open the app itself.
- Lock Individual Chats: For highly private conversations, you can lock specific chats so they can only be opened with your device’s biometric or a secret code.
- Turn on Two-Step Verification: Protect your account from being accessed on other devices by setting up a six-digit PIN. You can also link an email address to help reset your PIN if forgotten.
- Control Your Presence: Decide who can see your Last Seen status, Profile Photo, About information, and Status updates (Everyone, My Contacts, My Contacts Except…, or Nobody).
- Disable Read Receipts (Blue Ticks): Turn off the blue ticks that show when you’ve read a message. Keep in mind this also prevents you from seeing when others have read your messages (except in group chats). Reading messages in notifications or using Airplane Mode before opening can offer sneaky workarounds.
- Silence Unknown Callers: Reduce spam and scams by automatically silencing calls from numbers not in your contacts. These calls will still appear in your Calls tab.
- Block Contacts: Easily block unwanted contacts to prevent them from messaging or calling you.
- Protect Your IP Address on Calls: Enable a setting to protect your IP address during calls, which can help hide your location from others.
Data & Storage Management
WhatsApp media can quickly consume your phone’s storage. Here’s how to manage it.
- Manage Storage Usage: See how much storage space WhatsApp is using and break it down by chat or group to easily identify conversations with the most media. You can then mass delete media from specific chats.
- Control Media Auto-Download: Prevent photos, videos, and documents from automatically downloading to your device, especially when using mobile data. You can set media to download only on Wi-Fi or manually.
- Prevent Media Saving to Gallery: Stop WhatsApp photos and videos from automatically saving to your phone’s main photo gallery or camera roll. You can also set this preference for specific chats.
- Save Data on Calls: If you have a limited data plan, enable ‘Low Data Usage’ for WhatsApp calls to reduce the amount of data consumed.
Organisation & Utility
WhatsApp offers several features to help you manage your conversations and interactions more efficiently.
- Create a Community: Organise multiple related groups under a single umbrella with the Communities feature. This is great for larger organisations or interests.
- Follow Channels: Stay updated on topics of interest by following official channels from brands, news outlets, and organisations.
- Use Broadcast Lists (BCC): Send the same message to multiple contacts simultaneously, but have it appear as a private message to each recipient. This is like using BCC in email.
- Create Chat Shortcuts: For your most frequent conversations, add a shortcut directly to your device’s home screen for quick access.
- Set Custom Notifications: Assign unique alert tones to specific contacts or group chats so you can tell who’s messaging you without looking at your phone.
- Change Chat Wallpaper: Personalise the background of your chats with different colours, images, or even photos from your library. You can set different wallpapers for individual chats.
- Use WhatsApp Web/Desktop: Access your chats on your computer using WhatsApp Web or the desktop app. Joining the multi-device beta allows you to use linked devices without your phone needing to be online.
- Use Multiple Accounts: Some devices allow you to have two separate WhatsApp accounts on the same phone, useful for separating work and personal life.
- Share Your Live Location: Let friends or family track your movements in real-time for a set period, useful when meeting up or travelling.
- Add Dates to Calendar (iOS only): If a message contains a date, it might be automatically highlighted, allowing you to tap it and instantly create a calendar event.
- Schedule Events: Create and share scheduled events within chats, complete with a name, description, date, time, and even a WhatsApp call link.
- Utilise Meta AI: Access AI features directly within WhatsApp, including generating text responses, images, and even suggesting videos. You can ask it questions about almost anything.
- Transcribe Voice Messages: If you can’t listen to a voice note, WhatsApp can provide a text transcript. (Note: you may need to enable this in settings).
- Send Bulk Messages (Third-Party): While not a native feature, some third-party tools (like Chrome add-ins) allow you to send messages to a list of unsaved contacts, often used for business communications. It’s important to note this usually requires external applications or add-ins.
Exploring these many WhatsApp tricks can truly transform your messaging experience, making it more efficient, private, and tailored to your needs.
