WhatsApp Status gets voice messages, private audience option and visual link previews

Representative Image: WhatsApp logo cutout placed on a keyboard

WhatsApp on February 7 announced a series of new updates as the Meta-owned messaging app looks to bolster its ephemeral status feature that currently allows users to share text, photo, and video that disappear after 24 hours.

WhatsApp is introducing the ability for people to record and share voice messages up to 30 seconds on WhatsApp status along with status reactions that will enable them to provide a quick and easy way to respond to status updates from their friends and close contacts.

For people sharing links on their WhatsApp Status, the messaging app will now show a visual preview of the link content. Apart from making the statuses look better, these previews will provide users a better idea of what the link is before they click, the company said.

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WhatsApp is also offering users the ability to choose who views their status by enabling them to change their privacy settings per status. WhatsApp said that the user's most recent audience selection will be saved and used as the default for their next status.

In a bid to drive better discovery of status messages among user's contacts, WhatsApp will also show a status profile ring around the user's profile picture whenever they share a status update. This will be visible in the chat lists, group participant lists, and contact info, the company said.

It's worth noting that WhatsApp has been testing several of these features with select users in recent weeks. The messaging app said it has started rolling these features globally and will be available to everyone in the coming weeks.

According to reports, WhatsApp is also working on the ability to let users pin important messages on top of the conversation along with a new text editor for the drawing tool.