Two days to celebrate Facebook-owned social messaging platform, WhatsApp eighth birthday, we shall be celebrating with the new revamped status feature that the company begun rolling out yesterday to users in Europe before it goes global. The feature will ultimately be available to all WhatsApp users on Android, iPhone, and Windows.
The social platform has gotten rid of the boring ‘Hey there, I’m using WhatsApp‘ the default WhatsApp status seen on your first install. The new update to the status, allows users to share photos and videos with your friends and contacts on WhatsApp in an easy and secure way. Yes, even your status updates are end-to-end encrypted.
“Just like eight years ago when we first started WhatsApp, this new and improved status feature will let you keep your friends who use WhatsApp easily updated in a fun and simple way,” Jan Koum writes in a Blog post.
Getting started:
Head to the Status tab which is seen appearing Chats and Calls tabs. The camera interface will launch when you press on the New Status button giving you the option to select an existing photo in your gallery or simply shoot a short video. In addition, you’re in position to use the rear and front camera.
You can share photos, videos, and GIFs as your WhatsApp Status, which are visible to all your contacts using the app by default and the updates will disappear after 24 hours.
All the new Statuses that you add will be put under your Status Tab. If you delete a WhatsApp Status you created, it will also be deleted from the phones of all your contacts – even from ones who’ve already seen that status.
Notably, within the status tab you will see 1. your most recent WhatsApp status – swiping through to see who’s seen your status, similar to who sees your messages in WhatsApp groups, 2. recent updates – showing WhatsApp Status messages that your friends have created in the last 24 hours, and 3. muted, which lists updates from users you’ve muted.
One thing you might want to know is that the new WhatsApp Status update is almost similar to the Stories feature in either SnapChat or Instagram.
There are some reports claiming that, some BlackBerry and Nokia users won’t be getting this update.
