We told you last week about an update that WhatsApp may be bringing to its disappearing messages function. While currently, the only setting is for 7 days, the Facebook-owned messaging app is planning to bring 24-hours and 90-day options as well. It looks like this feature upgrade will be going to Samsung Galaxy owners first, specifically the recently announced Galaxy Z Fold 3 and the Galaxy Z Flip 3 smartphones before rolling out in the stable version to everyone else.
T3 reports that the upcoming disappearing messages option for WhatsApp will initially be exclusive for Samsung Galaxy owners, although they didn’t really say where this information comes from. But if it’s true, it will be a huge scoop for Samsung users if they are heavy WhatsApp users. But they will most likely need to have the new Galaxy Z Fold 3 and the Galaxy Z Flip 3 as per the rumors. There’s no information if it will also roll out earlier to other Galaxy devices.
Currently, the disappearing messages feature is of course available for everyone but you’ll only see the 7-day option so you’ll have to wait a week before your message disappears. In the WhatsApp beta program, some are seeing a new 90-day option alongside the 24-hour option that they’ve been testing out as well. So in a future stable update, users will actually have three options. There’s also a current feature that lets receivers view a photo or video once and it disappears so that’s also an option if you want to send a truly ephemeral message.
This is a reminder also that the disappearing messages feature has to be activated for each conversation and isn’t a setting for all your chats. You’ll have to tap on the three dots menu at the top of the chat and select “Group info”. In that menu, you’ll have to click on the “disappearing messages” option and it will tell you how it works. You then click the “on” button since the other options aren’t there yet. But when they do arrive, you’ll have to choose between 24 hours, 7 days, or 90 days.
There’s no specific date yet when we’ll see these new options on the Galaxy devices. But since they’re being beta tested already, this might be really soon.
