WhatsApp began working on its Reactions feature back in September. In a recent report, the social media app is still making some changes to improve the function because it has plans to launch it next year.
WhatsApp Reactions Feature
According to WABetainfo, the features will be available in the chat threads, individual threats, and group threads. The site also stated that users could see who reacted to the message by viewing the reaction information tab.
In the screenshot posted by WABetainfo on its Twitter account, the reactions can be seen placed in two different tabs.
The All tabs display all of the available reactions, while the second tab will display the most recent emoji you’ve used. You can click on the figure to see everyone who reacted to the message.
According to 9to5Mac, only 6 emojis can be used in one message. The current figures available are Love, Like, Laugh, Sad, Surprised, and Thanks.
For now, it is not clear whether WhatsApp will make the emoji available as a reaction, just like what Facebook has now, or if it will be limited to the way that Twitter is working with reactions.
The Reaction feature of WhatsApp is still under development, and there is still no specific date as to when it will be released.
Other Features
WhatsApp is also preparing to launch another feature that allows you to play audio messages at different speeds. Currently, you can play audio messages at different types of speed but it can’t be applied to those that are forwarded.
An audio message is a forwarded voice note. Once you’ve forwarded a voice not, it is not possible to change the speed of the audio because there is no playback speed button. However, WhatsApp’s possible new feature will add that to the audio message function.
Another feature that WhatsApp is working on is the “Delete Message for Everyone” feature. Currently, users can delete the message an hour after sending them.
Now, the platform is testing the feature of being able to delete the message after a week, so you can easily backtrack on a thread and delete old messages if you need to.
The platform will also let its users hide the last seen messages, profile pictures, and selected contacts.
Currently, users can hide their profile picture, last seen messages, and the about section of their contacts, but there is no option to hide them from specific accounts.
Also, WhatsApp will soon let users customize stickers on the mobile app. The feature can now be used on the desktop version of the app. There is no specific date as to when the feature will be available but the platform wants to make it possible for users to upload their pictures first and turn them into a sticker.
The platform is also planning to introduce a cropping feature for the pictures and allow users to past two pictures simultaneously.
WhatsApp has been working on adding new features on both its desktop version and mobile app version to attract more users and make the current ones stay.
