WhatsApp is great. Besides its recent ad-tracking drama, privacy issues and the fact that you can’t use it on more than one device at a time. Okay, maybe it is not that great after all. However, the company is working on making the world’s most popular chat service even better thanks to multi-device account support. The company confirmed that the long-rumoured feature is headed our way.
WhatsApp says that multi-device support is entering public beta in the coming months. The feature will allow users to link up to four devices to their WhatsApp account and use the app on all four devices without the need to have their phone connected to the same network. The company is also adding new “view once” and disappearing mode” to the ecosystem.
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According to WABetaInfo, who hosted an interview with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and WhatsApp head Will Cathcart, the multi-device support will also make the chat client iPad friendly. So there’s a good chance users can soon pick up their iPad and start chatting away on it.
As for the “view once” feature, it will allow users to send content to another user that vanishes after it has been viewed. The “disappearing mode” will also enable users with the option to turn on disappearing messages across all chat threads.
Zuckerberg says that the multi-device support will not compromise the end-to-end encryption that the service offers for its user base. In the interview he said:
It’ll still be end-to-end encrypted. It’s been a big technical challenge to get all your messages and content to sync properly across devices even when your phone battery dies, but we’ve solved this and we’re looking forward to getting it out soon!”
WhatsApp did not confirm a release date for the above-mentioned features but said it will be entering public beta in the next month or two.
