
WhatsApp is slowly becoming the dominant chat app in the world. The Facebook-owned messaging app has been constantly releasing new updates and features to stay ahead of its competitors. In the last year and a half, WhatsApp has launched several new features but there are few things that it still can learn from its competitors like Telegram, Signal etc. Here, are the five critical features that are still missing in WhatsApp.
Censoring inappropriate content: WhatsApp has become infamous for fuelling fake news and violence. It has become a major outlet used for spreading hate speech and false stories. The Indian government has also asked the company to stop and trace problematic messages. Despite the problems, WhatsApp has refused to censor the content as it would short-circuit the encrypted security that is at the heart of the app's popularity.
Privacy: The Biggest problem with WhatsApp is its registration process. WhatsApp users are required to feed in their phone numbers and this contact number can be seen by anyone added in our contact list. Unfortunately, there is no way to hide your phone number on WhatsApp. The app requires your valid phone number to let you login into the service.
File transfer limit: WhatsApp recently boasted about its 100MB file transfer limit but it wasn't long before the chat app was mocked by users on Twitter. While 100MB isn't bad - and is a big improvement over the 16MB limit WhatsApp used to have but is nowhere close to the Telegram which allows its users to send files of up to 1.5GB!
Ephemeral messaging: Several chat apps like Snapchat and Telegram offers ephemeral messaging where the sent messages automatically disappear from the recipient's screen after it is viewed. Even Instagram users can now send ephemeral messages but WhatsApp doesn't have it.
Dark Mode: There has been a lot of talk about WhatsApp getting 'Dark Mode' but it is not out yet. The feature has been under-development for long now and reports suggest that 'Dark Mode' might finally see the light in the coming few months. Beyond the aesthetics, the dark mode on WhatsApp will make it easier for people to use the Facebook-owned app at night.
Edited By: Udit Verma
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