WhatsApp announced a slew of new features in 2019, however, most of these features haven’t made their way to the instant messaging platform yet such as the dark mode, self-destructing messages, face unlock for Android, et al. However, there are high chances that these features would arrive in 2020.
Dark Mode
If there’s one feature by WhatsApp that people have been waiting for a long time then it’s the dark mode which has long been under its development phase now. Apart from carrying along with it an aesthetically-pleasing dark design factor, dark mode also adds to the overall user experience by improving readability, reducing eye-fatigue, and enhancing the overall battery consumption on the device among others. WhatsApp Dark Mode will be available in three options and when turned out the text would turn white and the background will become black. WhatsApp has been releasing a slew of features for the instant messaging app in the past year including new placeholders for the dark mode such as a new VoIP screen with dark elements.
Security Face Unlock
WhatsApp released security features for WhatsApp including the fingerprint scanner. The app would release another security feature in 2020, namely, the face unlock feature which would work in a similar fashion as face unlock on our phones. However, not a lot of details about this feature are out yet.
Last Seen For Select-Few Friends
Last seen has been on WhatsApp for a long time now. However, you couldn’t limit the feature to a select-few people in your WhatsApp Contacts. But, WhatsApp may allow certain users to view their last seen on the app in the coming year.
Self-Destructing / Disappearing Messages/ ‘Delete Messages’
WhatsApp first announced this feature, back in October, when it was named as ‘self-destructing’ or ‘disappearing’ messages. However, the feature was renamed to ‘delete messages’ last month in November. The feature would be available in the contact info or group settings and it lets you mark your WhatsApp chat as “deleted” by enabling the option “Delete messages”, in Group Info. Once you tap on the ‘delete messages’ option, you can select the message expiration time which includes 1 hour, 1 day, 1 week, and so on. This is different from self-destructing messages where the time limit included 5 seconds, 1 hour and so on.
Facebook Pay
WhatsApp might also release a new payment option for the WhatsApp users next year where they’d be able to make payments via ‘Facebook Pay’.
