WhatsApp announces new features including 'communities' for group chats

Other new features on the messaging platform include emoji reactions and admin delete

WhatsApp's new communities will give admins more control over messages sent to groups. Photo: Meta

WhatsApp has announced a number of new features that are coming to the platform, including the anticipated communities feature, which will give admins more control to do things such as make groups within a group, similar to how Discord works.

For example, someone might create a community for all their co-workers and break it down into smaller groups such as “carpooling” or “lunch orders”, meaning messages can be specifically sent to those in the smaller group chats. Or, a school teacher could use it to alert parents of pupils about must-read updates, or set up groups about specific classes or extra-curricular activities.

“It's been clear for a while that the way we communicate online is changing. Most of us use social networks and feeds to discover interesting content and stay updated. But for a deeper level of interaction, messaging has become the centre of our digital lives. It's more intimate and private, and with encryption, it's more secure too,” says Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Meta, in a post on Facebook.

“Our messaging services are built around one-to-one text messaging — and that will stay the core of what we do. But we've also been working on building out the next generation of private messaging. With today's launch, we're taking this further and enabling people to not only communicate with close friends and contacts, but also with all of the different communities in your life.”

Other features rolling out on WhatsApp include reaction emojis, similar to those on Instagram, where a person can respond to a specific message with an emoji and no longer flood a chat with a new message altogether.

Meanwhile, the admin delete feature will allow them to mass delete errant or problematic messages from everyone’s chat. An increase in the file-sharing size will now support files up to two gigabytes, making it easier for people to collaborate.

Meta maintains that chats will continue to be protected with end-to-end encryption, preventing WhatsApp or any other third party from being able to access or read them.