Whatsapp has decided to follow through with the trend and introduced disappearing messages. Now you can manually activate the option with the latest version of Whatsapp. It is available for both Android and iOS platforms conveniently.
Follow through with this guide to learn how to activate it. Additionally, we provide you everything related to the feature, its uses, benefits, and much more. Therefore, this article will be divided further into various categories. With that being said, let’s begin with:
More About WhatsApp:
Activate Whatsapp Disappearing Messages Feature: Steps
First, you need the up-to-date version of Whatsapp. Make sure to check your play store for any new version. Once you have the latest version, follow through with these steps:
- Open the Whatsapp app on your phone.
- Next, select anyone from your chat list to open the chat.
- Now, on the top right corner, click on the three dots (more options)
- Select ‘View Contact’ or ‘Contact Information’
- There, below the notification settings and media visibility, you will see the ‘Disappearing Messages’ option above Encryption.
- Click on it, and it will give you more information related to the feature.
- Toggle it on or off.
If you want to deactivate the feature, you would have to return to the option. It will turn off by following the same steps. Remember, you will have to manually enable or disable each person’s feature or group on your chat list. There isn’t any Whatsapp option or feature that would enable or disable it collectively for everyone.
Now that you know how to activate the feature let’s look at some other relevant information.
Contact Specific Feature And Group Option:
As mentioned above, you would have to visit each contact’s chat and information to enable disappearing messages. You can do it for the groups, as well. The lack of automatic function might be a little less convenient, but nothing changes on a big scale. It is similar to muting someone individually.
If you want to deactivate the disappearing messages, you have to do that individually, as well. Of course, everyone will get notified. But more about notifications is given below for you to read.
Before that, you need to understand how activation truly works.
Two-Way Authentication For Activation:
Disappearing messages is not a one-way street. If you activate it, other people will get the notification. They can decide to enable it or go to the settings to disable it. Therefore, you can’t sneak it past anyone. Another person has to agree with you about the disappearing messages.
Any one of the participants can change the disappearing option as they deem fit. This is to ensure that nobody can abuse this feature because people are well capable of doing that. It also gives equal control to both participating parties.
In simple words, you can stop the other person from disappearing the messages if you disagree with them.
Duration Of The Disappearing Messages:
Once you enable the feature, the messages will disappear after seven days. For seven days, all the participants (Or the other person, if it is one-on-one chat) can see the messages. Once the seven days pass for the messages, they will disappear from the list.
Unfortunately, unlike Facebook and Instagram, there isn’t any option available for you to customize this duration. Whatsapp doesn’t plan on giving you any more control regarding the time it takes for the messages to disappear. It is standard 7-day for everyone who is using the app.
Notifications For Disappearing Messages:
Everyone will receive the notification, as we’ve made it clear thus far. Here are some other needed information regarding the notifications:
1. Other Person Notification
As you might know, if another person activates the feature, you will get the notification like the older, standard notifications WhatsApp is known to provide. Other people will also receive the same alert if you activate the feature.
2. Screenshot Notification
However, there isn’t any notification for the screenshot. Facebook and Instagram will notify the other person, but Whatsapp wouldn’t. Hence, if you want to take a screenshot of the messages to save them, you can do it. Other people won’t receive any alert or notification regarding it.
3. Checking If Other Person Activated It For You
Apart from the notifications, a specific icon (a tiny clock) is introduced for the users. If you missed the notification for any reason, you could check for this clock icon. It will appear below the profile pic of people in the chat list (not individual chats).
If it is visible, then disappearing features are active. Otherwise, you are using the same old WhatsApp.
4. Pre-Activation Messages And Files
What happens to the files and messages you had before you activated the features? Well, don’t you worry! These files and messages will remain intact. They won’t disappear with the feature active. Any message or file that you send after activating the feature will disappear, not before that.
Loopholes Around Disappearing Feature:
If you had to activate the feature for one reason or another, but don’t want them to disappear, here are some loopholes that you can use to ensure you keep them:
1. Forwarded Messages
Any message that you forward to other people won’t disappear at all. It is the same as the delete for everyone command. Even if the other person deletes it for you, it has already been sent to the other person. The forwarded messages are at your mercy to delete.
So, if you want to share the messages or save them, you can forward them. But also remember, don’t forward messages by mistake, thinking that they will disappear. Because they really won’t.
You are in control of the forwarded messages. Only you can delete them for other people. Nobody will receive any notification for it either.
2. Saved Media And Files
Any file or media that you don’t download will disappear if anyone sent it with disappearing messages active. However, if you have downloaded the files or documents, they will remain intact. Whatsapp doesn’t have the power to modify your storage. Therefore, it can’t delete it from your storage. You can always access it from the respective folder you saved it to.
Whatsapp Backup Option For Disappearing Messages:
You can indeed backup disappearing messages with the help of Whatsapp backup. However, even after the restoration, they remain for that specific duration of seven days. If you’re trying to restore them past the period, they will automatically disappear, and there is nothing that you can do about it.
1. Saving The Disappearing Messages
You can manually copy and paste the messages to save them or use the above-given loopholes. These are the only known methods to get it done conveniently. You can’t use the favorite option or anything else. Nothing else will work for you at all.
It is similar to Snapchat in many ways, but it would need some more tweaks with security and patch fixes if they want to keep it adamant. As we have mentioned the loopholes, almost everyone knows about them.
The Need For Disappearing Messages:
What is the need for the disappearing messages feature? Are there any benefits to using disappearing messages on Whatsapp?
Well, it seems identical to the dark-theme trend which almost every app followed. Every app, website, and service provider introduced a dark mode, night mode, or something similar after its advent.
You can say that Snapchat is the pioneer of disappearing messages. We all know that once you view the snap or messages, they will disappear unless you save them. If you save any message or snap, it will be available for both of the participants. Similarly, you can determine the duration for deletion of these messages, as well. Usually, they disappear at least within 24 hours.
Taking inspiration from Snapchat, as Instagram is trying hard to copy it, they introduced the disappearing messages. Following it, Facebook, the parent company, also did it. As Facebook did it, it would be inevitable for Whatsapp, owned by Facebook, to get the same feature.
The List Of Benefits:
- It saves unnecessary use of cache and storage even though text files don’t occupy much space.
- You have a much cleaner messaging experience. Those who like to delete chats often to keep it fresh would undoubtedly benefit from it.
- The messages that get backed up will reduce in amount and space. Backups can be quite spacious, with everything inclusive.
- It is a great way to maintain privacy and limit the sharing or access to messages between people.
Frequently Asked Questions:
Ans: Yes. Whatsapp is very safe to use. It is the first app to introduce encrypted messages. Even the authorities at Facebook can’t access these messages to read them. You won’t have to worry about any security leaks. However, it is still prone to various bad actors attacks that are common on it.
Therefore, you should always take some precautions and maintain strong security for your device by installing anti-virus and other essential tools to reinforce your security. A VPN never fails to amaze.
Ans: There have been a lot of controversies regarding the Whatsapp Privacy Policy feature. It is not as bad as it sounds like. Whatsapp Privacy Policy is explicitly for businesses or people with a large stream of followers that use business accounts.
Even then, it just uses data to personalize ads. As a personal user who is talking to friends, family, or personal WhatsApp, you won’t have to worry about any of these data leaks. Nobody in the Facebook or Whatsapp department can access or read your messages. These are still end-to-end encrypted, including the calls.
Ans: Facebook now owns Whatsapp. Therefore, it is banned anywhere you have a Facebook ban. This includes China as they like to use their unique Hike messengers. Even if you are in a country that has banned Whatsapp, you can access it through a premium VPN. That is if you find any use to doing that.
Conclusion:
That’s everything we could find related to the disappearing Whatsapp feature. We hope that it was an informational article and you learned something. As long as you keep these things in mind, you won’t have any problem using them. We have also provided you with instructions to activate it without any inconvenience.
Don’t be surprised if many other apps also end up providing the same feature. Go ahead and enjoy the feature if you’d like. These are still fresh, and there will likely be many essential tweaks to make them more secure.
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