WhatsApp has had a busy year with the chat app already releasing a swathe of upgrades and dramatic changes in 2020. Over the past eight months, we’ve been treated to a Dark Mode, animated sticker packs and the ability to talk to more people on group video chats.
These are all useful changes but there could be even more to come from the Facebook-owned firm with plenty of rumours suggesting some even bigger upgrades could be just months away from an official release.
Express.co.uk has been checking out what WhatsApp might be planning and here’s all the bonus features that could be coming to your phone soon.
SILENCE THOSE OLD CHATS
WhatsApp’s Vacation Mode has been rumoured for months with this setting able to silence old group chats that you may have archived.
WhatsApp was thought to be developing this setting earlier this year before it being put on ice. Now the ever-reliable team at Wabetainfo has spotted this upgrade in a beta version of the app for Android.
Vacation Mode could be really handy for anyone who gets fed up of seeing old chats suddenly springing back to life. It seems there will be two settings included in the mode including stopping notifications altogether and also auto-hiding inactive chats. There’s no word on a release for Vacation Mode but it is currently being tested so more news on this could arrive soon.
READ MORE: WhatsApp is finally fixing one of its biggest flaws and this is the proof
FREE UP SOME SPACE
If your phone is always full to the brim then WhatsApp could soon help you free up some space.
A feature called Storage Usage is currently under development with a release possible over the coming months.
This update will reveal the amount of memory certain content within WhatsApp, such as photos and videos, are taking up.
Screenshots even show how it will work with WhatsApp fans able to display files in size order which will mean they can instantly see the worst offenders.
There’s even the option to view how much has been forwarded to other people in your contacts and check out the size of certain chats.
USE WHATSAPP ON MORE DEVICES
WhatsApp could finally be about to allow its billions of users to access the app on numerous devices.
According to WABetaInfo, it appears that the Facebook-owned chat app has begun testing a feature called “Linked Devices”.
As the name suggests, this will allow WhatsApp fans to add more than one device to their accounts meaning they can chat from a PC, smartphone and tablet without any fuss.
Currently, the only way to do this is via WhatsApp Web but this service requires the primary smartphone that’s used for the account to be powered up and connected to the web.
The new update would end all that with up to four devices all having unique access to chats simultaneously.
FINALLY..AN iPAD APP!
WhatsApp has been hard at work on an iPad app for a while now. While there is already a desktop app, this is essentially just the online messaging portal wrapped-up in a Windows 10 or macOS app window. You’ll even need to scan a QR code from your smartphone periodically to ensure you stay logged in and able to send or receive messages. And if you’re thinking of making or receiving video calls from a PC – forget it.
But that’s all set to change. It’s thought a dedicated iPad app is coming soon and it could launch alongside the Linked Devices feature mentioned above.