To Give Competition To Zoom, WhatsApp Now Allows Group Call Of 8 Participants
By Since day one of lockdown, the demand for video conference apps is witnessing a significant upsurge. Market disrupters like the Zoom app are running ahead of giants like Facebook and Google. But how long? In its latest update on iOS and Android, WhatsApp has given the feature of group call with a maximum of 8 participants. WhatsApp was testing the same function in its beta version, but it finally rolled out its stable update on April 27, 2020. The feature can only be used after updating to the latest version of the app from Google Play Store or Apple App Store.
Facebook is the parent of WhatsApp and people were expecting from WhatsApp to see an updated version as Facebook updated its almost every app just a few days ago. The updated changelog says that 8 participants can be added in either video or voice call, only when all of the participants’ apps are updated.
How to make group video calls?
- Make sure you have updated your app to the latest version
- Open the ‘Calls tab’
- Click on the call button situated on the upper right side
- Click on New Group Call
- It will ask for adding the participants. You can add up to 8 members in a group call
Before this update, WhatsApp only allowed group calls of a maximum of four participants. But, to give competition to the now leading Zoom, it extended the limit of maximum participants.
iOS users are given one more feature in the new update. This new feature is called the context menu. When you long-press a message in WhatsApp iOS, it shows a list of six options – Star, Reply, Forward, Copy, Info, and Delete. This ‘Info’ feature is added only in the latest update.
More features to come:
If we talk about the video call feature, this 8-participants update is just a beginning. Before rolling out this WhatsApp update, Facebook updated its Messenger app with a new feature in Messenger Rooms. In this new feature, a group call of a maximum of 50 participants can be made.
After the stable version, WhatsApp has also rolled out a beta version – version 2.20.139 beta for Android. In this version, WhatsApp has integrated with Facebook Messenger Rooms. This clearly means that WhatsApp won’t stop extending the maximum number of participants to only eight.
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