After a long wait, Facebook-owned social messaging platform; WhatsApp globally rolled out its newest update, the ‘Revoke’ feature which is available for all its users on Android, iOS, Windows, and Web. Bad news for users on Blackberry and Symbian, WhatsApp end its app support for them updating to the newest versions of Android and iOS you will be able to see this feature.
The revoke feature works for both individual and group chats – so you’re able to delete embarrassing messages, or mistaken sent messages.
So before you update your app to use this feature, here are 5 things we actually found out that it can do
1. Time to revoke the message
The sender has a window of only seven (7) minutes under which s/he can delete the sent message. After this time period, unfortunately you won’t be to see the revoke pop-up menu. So act first.
2. Deleting the message from both parties
Yes! the feature allows you to delete the message from both parties (You and the Recipient). So you can ‘delete for you’ or ‘delete for everyone.’ Select what suits you best.
3. Your message will still be read.
Now this is really annoying. Some WhatsApp users are always active on the platform and will end up reading your message. For you message not to be read is when the user is offline or away from their phone, etc. So, yes the recipient can read you message before it gets deleted.
During the beta tests, WhatsApp reportedly said that the sender can only revoke their message only if the recipient hasn’t read it first. I guess this can only work within the 7 minute time period which is so uncertain for some one to be off that long especially those that are always active on the platform. Once you delete your message, they can still spread the rumour since they had read it.
4. Delete Notification
Once you choose the option of ‘delete for everyone’ the recipients will be notified that a message was deleted by you. For those that have tried the feature, you will notice that in your chat window (for both parties) you will have a message reading, ‘This message has been deleted’.
5. You will not be notified if deleting for everyone was not successful
The company also feels that there will be occasions when the feature will not function and your message is not deleted. In that case the app will not notify the user.
