Tag: whatsapp (Page 1 of 5)

WhatsApp is a really popular, Facebook-owned messaging service, although most of its users are outside the US. While it’s encrypted end-to-end to protect you from spying, WhatsApp shares read receipts by default—so people can see if you’ve read their message—as well as sharing the last time you were online.

If you’re concerned about your privacy, or just want to be able to respond to messages in your own time without offending people, you should turn both of these features off.

I’m using iOS screenshots as examples but the process is the same on Android. Here’s how to do it.

Open WhatsApp and head to Settings > Account > Privacy.

To keep people from knowing you read their message, tap the Read Receipts switch to turn it off. This means you won’t be able to see whether or not they’ve read yours either, though.

To stop WhatsApp showing your last online time, tap Last Seen and then select Nobody. You also won’t be able to see other people’s last online time if you have it turned off.

WhatsApp is a great messaging app and, although it is secure, by default, it shares more information than many people like with their contacts. I personally leave read receipts and my last online time switched off; I recommend you do too.

WhatsApp, now owned by Facebook, is one of the most popular messaging apps available. It’s almost completely replaced SMS in parts of the world.

Update: You can still access and send WhatsApp messages from the web and your computer, but the process has been updated throughout the years. Here’s how to use WhatsApp on your computer.

Unlike a lot of other messaging apps, you can only use WhatsApp on a single device: your smartphone. If you log in on another phone, you get logged out of the first one. For years, there wasn’t even a way to use WhatsApp on a computer. Thankfully, that’s changed.

To use WhatsApp on a computer, you have two options: the web app, or a desktop app (that is really just a self-contained version of the web app). The set up process is identical for both versions.

Either head to web.whatsapp.com or download and install the latest version of the WhatsApp client for Windows or macOS.

WhatsApp on the computer is an extension of the instance running on your smartphone rather than a separate app. Your phone needs to be on and connected to the internet for WhatsApp to work on your computer.

This means that, rather than a traditional login process, you need to pair your phone to the web or desktop app with a QR code. When you first open the app or web app, a QR code will pop up.

Next, open WhatsApp on your smartphone. On iOS, go to Settings > WhatsApp Web/Desktop. On Android, click the menu button and choose WhatsApp Web.

If WhatsApp doesn’t already have permission to access your phone’s camera, you’ll need to grant it. Then, scan the QR code on your computer’s screen.

The WhatsApp client on your computer will then connect to your phone. You’ll now be able to send and receive WhatsApp messages on your computer.

Once you’ve set it up, WhatsApp will automatically connect any time you have the desktop or web app open. If you want to log out, click on the menu dropdown icon and select Log Out.

You can also log out of all your computers from the mobile app by going to the WhatsApp Web screen and tapping “Log out from all computers”.

Although the computer solution isn’t perfect—a proper app would be nice—it’s functional and easier to use than a pure mobile app.

WhatsApp is a great way to stay in contact with people, regardless of what smartphone they use. And, like SMS, WhatsApp supports Group Chats so you can talk with a group of friends, your sports team, clubs, or any other group of people. Here’s how to start a group chat on WhatsApp.

Open WhatsApp on your smartphone. On iOS, tap New Group. On Android, tap the Menu icon and then New group.

Scroll down through your contacts and tap on anyone you want to add to the group. When you’re done, tap Next.

Add a Subject for your Group Chat and, if you want, a thumbnail.

Tap Create and your Group Chat is ready to go. Any message sent to it, gets shared with everyone.

In a Group Chat, even if you have Read Receipts turned off, you’re still able to see who’s received and read your messages. Just swipe to the left on any message.

ADVERTISEMENT

To manage your Group Chat, click on its name. Here, you can add new participants, delete the group, and change the Subject and Thumbnail.

If you want to make someone else an Admin—they’ll be able to add new members and kick out old ones—or remove someone from your Group Chat, tap on their name and then the relevant option.

Now you’ll be able to keep up with all your friends easily—no matter where they live or what kind of phone they have.

Group Chats are awesome if you’re in a club, want to keep in touch with all your friends, or are trying to organize something. Unfortunately, if you’re busy and the other members decide to have a long, detailed conversation about the latest episode of Game of Thrones, your phone is going to beep and flash constantly.

Here’s how to stop that happening while still letting notifications from other chats and apps through.

Open WhatsApp on your phone and go to the offending Group Chat. Tap the group’s name to get to the Group Info screen.

From the Group Info screen, tap Mute. Then, select how long you want to turn off notifications from the group: 8 Hours, 1 Week, or 1 Year.

If you’re completely fed up with all the notifications and want to leave the Group Chat for good, scroll down to the bottom of the Group Info page and tap Exit Group instead.

Group Chats can be really useful, but the constant notifications can get a bit much. If you want to stop a WhatsApp Group Chat from taking over your phone, just Mute it.

One gray check mark means that the message has been successfully sent from your phone, but that it hasn’t been delivered to your recipient yet. When you send a message, it will normally show a single gray checkmark for a few moments while it’s sent.

If a single grey checkmark sticks around longer, it means that your contact’s phone is probably off or not connected to the internet. As soon as they come online, the message will get delivered.

A single grey checkmark can also mean that you’ve been blocked.

Two Gray Checkmarks

Two gray checkmarks mean that your message has been delivered, but not read (or that it’s been delivered and the person you’re messaging has read receipts turned off). The next time they look at WhatsApp they’ll see your message.

In Group Chats, two gray checkmarks only appear when the message has been delivered to everyone in the group. Until then, WhatsApp will just show one checkmark.

Two Blue Checkmarks

Two blue checkmarks mean that your message has been read, or at least that the person you’re messaging has opened the message. You’ll only see blue checkmarks in individual messages if your contact has read receipts turned on.

In Group Chats, two blue checkmarks mean that your message has been read by everyone.

How to Find Out When Your Message Was Delivered and Read

To find out exactly when the person you’re messaging received or read your message, long press on it and select Info.

You’ll see what time your message got delivered and, if the person has read receipts turned on, what time it was read.

WhatsApp is a great service, but anyone with your phone number can message you through it. Whether you want to stop a particular spambot or former friend from contacting you, here’s how to do it.

What Does a Block Do?

When you block someone in WhatsApp:

• Messages they send to you will not be delivered.
• They will see that messages are not delivered, but won’t know why.
• They will no longer be able to see your Last Seen and Online information.
• Messages they have sent you will not be deleted.
• Message you have sent them will not be deleted.
• You will not be removed as a contact on their phone.
• They will not be removed as a contact on your phone.

If that sounds like what you want, read on.

How to Block Someone on WhatsApp

To block someone on WhatsApp for iOS, go to your chat with them and tap on their name along the top.

Scroll down and tap Block this Contact. Tap Block again to confirm you want to block them.

You can also go to Settings > Account > Privacy > Blocked.

Here you’ll see a list of all your blocked contacts. Tap Add New and search for the contact you want to block. Select them and they’ll be added to your blocked list.

To block someone on WhatsApp for Android, go to your chat with them and tap the three dots in the top right corner. Tap Block and confirm it. They’ll now be blocked.

Alternatively, you can go to Settings > Account > Privacy > Blocked Contacts, tap the add button and search for the contact you want to block.

How to Unblock Someone on WhatsApp

There are a few ways to unblock someone on WhatsApp. If you try to send a blocked contact a message, you’ll be prompted to unblock them. Tap Unblock to do it.

You can also reverse the process you used to block them. Go to your chat with the person you want to block. On iOS, tap their name, scroll down and tap Unblock this Contact. On Android, tap the three dots and then Unblock.

Finally, you can go to the Blocked Contacts screen. On iOS, tap Edit, then the red circle, then Unblock.

On Android, tap or tap and hold the name of the contact you want to unblock and tap Unblock from the pop-up menu.

Two-step verification is an important security protocol that is becoming more popular. Instead of just needing a password, you need your password and something else to log in to your account. This makes it much harder for attackers.

WhatsApp has always had the “something else”—it’s the phone number you associate with your account—but until recently, you haven’t been able to password protect your account. If someone stole your SIM card they could pop it into another phone, download WhatsApp and log right in.

Now that two-step verification is available, let’s look at how to set it up.

Setting Up Two-Step Verification in WhatsApp

Open WhatsApp and go to Settings > Account.

If you’re on the latest version of WhatsApp, you’ll see a Two-Step Verification option. If you don’t see it, update your app. Otherwise, tap Two-Step Verification and then Enable.

You’ll be prompted to enter a six-digit passcode and then confirm it. This should be different from your phone’s password for security.

ADVERTISEMENT

Next, enter and confirm your email address. There is the option to skip this step but we don’t recommend it. Without an email address attached to your WhatsApp account, you won’t be able to reset your password.

Tap “Done” and two-step verification will be enabled. You can disable it, or change your password or email address from the settings app at any time.

Now, the next time you set WhatsApp up on a new phone, you’ll need to enter your password as well as the one-time code sent to your phone number.

WhatsApp automatically saves media to your gallery. That sounds like a good idea, but when you’re part of multiple groups, this can take up a lot of storage space. Here’s how you can stop WhatsApp from auto-saving images.

Stop WhatsApp from Auto-Saving Images on the iPhone

By default, all photos and videos you receive are saved directly to the Camera Roll in the Photos app on your iPhone.

To disable the feature, open the WhatsApp app and go to the “Settings” tab. Here, select the “Cheats” option.

From this screen, tap on the toggle next to “Save to Camera Roll” to turn off the auto-saving feature.

Photos and videos will still be downloaded automatically on your iPhone, but they’ll stay in the WhatsApp memory.

If you want to manually save media to the Camera Roll, open the photo or video and tap on the “Share” button.

Here, tap on the “Save” option.

As we mentioned above, the WhatsApp app is still downloading photos and videos, it’s just keeping them in its app store. But this can quickly add up. If you’d like to stop media downloading right at the source, go to the “Settings” tab and select the “Data and Storage Usage” option.

Here, select the “Photos” option.

From this screen, switch to “Never.”

You can now do the same for the Audio, Videos, and Documents sections as well.

Now, when you receive any media, you’ll see a “Download” button. Tap on it to download the media.

Stop WhatsApp from Auto-Saving Images on Android

The process for Android is slightly different. Open the WhatsApp app and tap on the three-dot menu button from the top toolbar.

Here, tap on the “Settings” option.

From the Settings page, tap on the “Data and Storage Usage” section.

In the “Media Auto-Download” section, you’ll see three different options for mobile data, Wi-Fi, and roaming.

Go through each section and uncheck the Photos, Audio, Video, and Documents options to disable auto-download.

If you want to enable auto-download, but you don’t want the media to show up in your Gallery app, you can do so from the “Chat” section in settings.

Here, tap on the toggle next to the “Media Visibility” option. Now, newly downloaded media won’t show up in your Gallery app.

Speaking of WhatsApp groups that end up taking a lot of storage space, a new feature lets you stop anyone from adding you to a group without your consent.

Although it took a few years, WhatsApp now allows users to search for and send GIFs from within the app. Here’s how to do it.

Open your WhatsApp chat with the person you want to send a GIF to, and tap the + icon in the bottom left. Next, select Photo & Video Library.

If the GIF you want to send is already saved on your phone, you can select it from here and skip the next step. You can also turn any videos you want to send into GIFs. Select the video you want to send from your phone and then, in the editor, tap the blue switch in the top right corner.

If you want to search for a GIF on the internet instead, tap the GIF button in the bottom left.

WhatsApp is using the Tenor GIF keyboard as its source, so there are millions of choices. Use the search bar at the top to enter what emotion, TV show, or other term you want to use.

Select the GIF you want to send and it’ll open in the editor. With the tools at the top, you can trim, crop, add emojis, add text, or draw over the top of the GIF. You can also add a caption.

Once you’re done, tap the Send icon to message the GIF to your friend.

If someone sends you a GIF, or you really like the one you’ve just sent, you can also save it for later. Tap and hold on any GIF in WhatsApp and tap the Star icon. It will now appear in the Starred tab when you search for a GIF.

Despite being an terrible image format, GIFs have taken over the world because they’re so fun to use. WhatsApp has finally fallen under their spell too.

Sometimes you just want to delete a message from WhatsApp. Maybe you’ve sent a message meant for your partner to your mother, or perhaps you just want to hide personal details like a password you’ve shared. Whatever the reason, let’s look at how to do it.

With WhatsApp, there are two options when you’re deleting messages. If you delete a message you send within seven minutes of it being sent, you can remove it from every recipient’s device. This works whether you’re messaging one person or a group. They’ll just see a note saying the message was deleted. Even if they’ve read it already, as long as you delete it within the seven minutes, the message will vanish (although they’ll probably still remember what it said).

If you wait more than seven minutes to delete a message or delete a message someone else has sent to you, things are slightly different. You can still delete it from your device, but it will remain on everyone else’s. This will protect you if someone is going through your WhatsApp messages, but the information is still out there somewhere.

On the iPhone

To delete a WhatsApp message on iOS, long press it and then tap the Delete button followed by the delete icon.

Select whether you want to Delete the Message for Everyone or just from your own device. If it’s been more than seven minutes since you sent the message or someone else sent it, you’ll only be able to remove it from your own device.

And just like that, the message is gone.

On Android

To delete a WhatsApp message on Android, long press on it and then tap the delete icon.

ADVERTISEMENT

If you’re trying to delete the message within seven minutes of sending it you’ll see the option to Delete for Everyone. Otherwise, you’ll only see Delete for Me. Select the option you want.

The message is now deleted.

WhatsApp has a neat feature where you can pin certain people to the top of the app. This means you can keep the important people in your life in the same place, above the rest of your chats. Here’s how to do it.

Open WhatsApp and go to the Chats screen.

On the iPhone, swipe to the right on the chat you want to pin to the top and then tap Pin. On Android, tap and hold on to the chat and then tap the pin icon.

This pins chat to the top and puts a little pin icon beside it.

It will stay on top even as new, unread messages come in.

You can pin up to three individual or group chats to the top for quick access. Now you can stop friends and family from getting hidden by over-active group chats.

Meeting up with your friends in an unfamiliar spot is a pain. Once you get away from rigid grids, finding a location becomes a challenge. The best thing to do, rather than sharing an address, is to share your exact GPS location. Here’s how to do it with WhatsApp.

Open a WhatsApp chat with the person you want to share your location with, tap the + icon, and select Location.

The simplest option is just to send where you are right now. Either select your Current Location or one of the Nearby Place suggestions.

If you’re planning to move around, or for safety reasons want to someone to always know where you are, select Share Live Location. You’ll get a warning making sure you’re aware that you’ll be sharing your live location even if you leave the app, so tap OK.

Next select how long you want to share your Live Location for. The options are 15 Minutes, 1 Hour, or 8 Hours. Add a comment if you want, then tap the Send button.

At any point you can tap Stop Sharing to stop sending your location. Otherwise, until the time expires, they’ll be able to see your location even if you move somewhere totally different.