Tired of WhatsApp typos? 15 minutes. This is now the maximum time you can edit text on WhatsApp. The long-awaited new update was announced this week. how to use it
A new feature to edit your messages on WhatsApp
Typing error? A poorly expressed idea? Missing information? On May 22nd, WhatsApp officially announced a new edit button to edit your messages!
WhatsApp has long allowed users to delete messages. Technically, it is already possible to correct typos by deleting the posted message and sending it again. However, when deleting a post, it is replaced with the note “This post has been deleted”, which is not a very practical feature.
IT’S HERE 📣 Message editing is now rolling out.
After sending a message, you now have up to 15 minutes to edit it. So you don’t have to worry if you miss it 🦆 pic.twitter.com/JCWNzmXwVr– whatsapp whatsapp) May 22, 2023
In a blog post, the messaging app announced:
“From fixing a simple spelling mistake to adding extra context to a message, we’re excited to give you more control over your chats.” All you have to do is long-press on a sent message, then press Selecting “Edit” from the menu for up to fifteen minutes.
To edit a message on WhatsApp, follow these steps:
- Open WhatsApp on your Android phone or iPhone.
- Open the WhatsApp conversation where you want to edit the message you just sent.
- Long press on the message you want to edit.
- On Android, select the pencil icon in the toolbar at the top. On iOS, select Edit from the menu that appears. You can now edit the sent message;
- Tap the checkmark next to the text entry to confirm that you’ve edited the message.
Modified messages are marked as “modified” so recipients know the content has changed. If you use WhatsApp for some private conversations, you should consider using chat lock in WhatsApp to add another layer of security to them.
The recipient of the message can therefore see that it has been modified, but cannot see the entire modification history. Changes made and all private messages, media files and calls are protected by end-to-end encryption.
WhatsApp would lag behind other apps
The new feature is similar to Apple’s update from last year, which allows users to edit and unlink messages between iPhones. Like Apple, edited messages in WhatsApp are tagged to let the recipient know the chat has been edited.
Telegram and Signal also already have this function. The same goes for Twitter. Followers of Twitter Blue, the paid version, can also edit a tweet up to 30 minutes after sending it. While the timeframe for processing a message isn’t as generous as Telegram’s 48-hour window, it’s still better than nothing.
“Tweeting will be more accessible and less stressful. You should be able to join the conversation in a way that makes sense to you, and we’ll continue to work on ways to make that easy for you,” Twitter said in a blog post at the time.
The WhatsApp blog notes that the feature has already started rolling out globally and will be available to all users “in the coming weeks.” The feature will be rolled out to WhatsApp’s 2 billion users in the coming weeks. India is one of its largest markets with 487 million users.