WhatsApp feature update to soon let you edit messages even after sending them

Popular instant messaging app WhatsApp may soon allow users to edit their chats even after sending them. This is not the first we’re hearing about such a feature. News that WhatsApp was working on an “edit” feature first broke cover in 2017. It was available for certain Beta users also, at that time, but it never made it out of testing. Once again, rumour mill is rife about said feature hinting the Meta-owned platform may not have completely given up on it.

WhatsApp feature update tracker, WABetaInfo, is reporting that WhatsApp is testing the edit feature, at the time of writing, on Android. There’s a chance it may arrive on iOS and desktop versions of WhatsApp, too, at some point. In its current form, users are being given an option to edit text after they’ve sent them by long-pressing it. Doing this, apparently, pops up a menu—naturally—that includes a dedicated edit option alongside the existing info and copy.

Editing a message will be obviously different from deleting it. While deleting a message erases it completely leaving you, then, to type a new message from scratch, editing will be a simpler option for when you’re simply looking to add more context or simply change the wording or the intended message behind it on the fly. Usually, such edit options are time-bound –much like deleting a text—which is to say you can only update your sent message withing a certain time frame. The said duration remains a mystery for now in case of WhatsApp’s new feature. Also, it remains to be seen, if WhatsApp would allow the recipient to know as and when the sender has updated a text. There should be an upper limit to how many times one can edit, too, which is again unknown at this point of time.

Be that as it may, the edit feature is still not ready for prime time, so it seems. It would be interesting to see if WhatsApp will make it available for more users in the days to come. There’s always a fair bit of concern attached to edit features in such apps. Miscreants could use it for nefarious means. Twitter now lets you edit Tweets if you’re willing to pay for it. How things pan out for WhatsApp’s take on it will hopefully become clear sooner to launch.   

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Originally appeared on: TheSpuzz