WASHINGTON ― After introducing Chat Lock, WhatsApp announced that it has started to roll out its Message Editing feature to all users globally.
This is a great feature to make quick changes to your text whether it is to correct a typo or to add a crucial context to your message.
he Meta-owned instant messaging service is used by over a billion people these days. However, its texting feature isn’t perfect. It often falls behind what competitors like Discord and Telegram have come up with.
The modified message will carry the label “Edited” without showing edit history.
Take note that the edit option is only available for up to 15 minutes after you’ve sent the message.
However, the good news is that other users won’t be able to view the edit history after the changes have been made. WhatsApp also emphasised that all personal messages, media and calls including your edited messages are protected with end-to-end encryption.
Previously, the only way to correct a message sent in haste or containing an error was to delete it and send a fresh one, with recipients alerted to the fact by the removed post being replaced with the phrase: “This message was deleted.”
WhatsApp said: “From correcting a simple misspelling to adding extra context to a message, we’re excited to bring you more control over your chats.
“All you need to do is long-press on a sent message and choose ‘Edit’ from the menu for up to 15 minutes after.”
Competing apps such as Telegram and Signal already allow users to edit messages, while Twitter rolled out the ability to edit tweets to select users last year.
Twitter offers an editing feature to subscribers to its Twitter Blue service, giving them a 30-minute window to edit a tweet after it has been sent.
Meta’s founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, flagged the WhatsApp change on his Facebook page, showing a message that had been changed from “Beast of luck!” to “Best of luck!”
Facebook, also owned by Meta, started to roll out the ability to edit posts and comments about a decade ago.
Its fellow Meta social media platform Instagram allows users to edit posts but not comments.
