5 things you could do on the app we bet you haven't taken note of

abiola

November 6, 2017 4:43 PM

Most Whatsapp are too busy doing basic chatting to be looking out for more functionalities that they could really use sometime.

Whatsapp is a universally used messaging app and has continued to improve on its functionality by introducing features.

The most recent it added was an 'Unsend' (Delete for everyone) feature that lets you recall messages you wish not to send on second thought.

But the instant messenger packs a number of features that most likely go unused because the user has not taken out time to explore.

Here are five features Whatsapp has to make your messaging experience richer.

Star feature

In your chat messages, you can star messages which helps you easily find a message when you need to. To star a message, just hold down the message and tap the star icon on the top screen. You can then get back the message in the app’s main menu anytime you wish.

Pinning feature

This is especially useful if you have a long list of chat messages. Pinning a particular chat like you would do a tweet would take that chat message up for easy re-visiting. And if you want to let go pinning, unpinning is as easy as holding down the chat and locating the ‘Unpin’ button at the top bar.

Mark as Unread

Where you have read a message but for some reason don’t have time to reply the person, you can mark the message as ‘Unread’ by holding down the chat , going to the three dotted lines at the top right, and selecting ‘’Mark as unread’’. A green circle will appear beside the particular chat as a reminder.

Using your phone assistants

For those who don’t like typing, you could employ the services of your virtual assistants - Siri, Google Assistant and Alexa to type the message for you.

For example, by uttering the command ‘’Ok Google’’, followed by the name of the person you want to message and the actual contents of the message.

Custom notifications

If you’re expecting an important WhatsApp message from someone, set a custom notification for them by opening the chat, tapping their name at the top and hitting Custom Notifications. Cool right?

Bonus: You can avoid the blue ticks and 'Last seen' features by going into Settings > Account > Privacy > Read Receipts. However, bear in mind that, by doing so, you’ll lose the ability to see when your own sent messages have been read.

Also, another clever way of reading your messages without triggering the blue ticks, is by enabling Airplanemode before opening your messages. - just remember to close the app before switching airplane mode off again.

abiola