WhatsApp adds three handy new features, here’s what they do

(Pocket-lint) – Whatsapp rolled out some new features over the past week, and they’re particularly useful if you find yourself on a lot of group calls. Will Cathcart, head of Whatsapp at Meta, announced the new features via Twitter:

Some new features for group calls on @WhatsApp: You can now mute or message specific people on a call (great if someone forgets to mute themselves!), and we’ve added a helpful indicator so you can more easily see when more people join large calls. pic.twitter.com/fxAUCAzrsy

— Will Cathcart (@wcathcart) June 16, 2022

We’re especially happy to see the ability to mute specific users, which should help prevent a call from getting derailed due to a crying baby or loud coffee shop. You can now direct message any participant, direct from the call screen, useful if you want to tell someone that you’ve muted them, for instance.

In addition, a pop-up banner will now announce when someone joins the call. Which is something you’d expect to happen regardless, but wasn’t the case previously. While none of these features are groundbreaking, they are good steps toward improving the WhatsApp group call experience.

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The platform has been hard at work improving its group features, recently bumping up the number of users allowed on a group call from 8 to 32 people.

As well as allowing a staggering 512 members in a group chat.

The new group call features are live now for most users, if you want to ensure that you can use them, be sure to keep your app updated.

Writing by Luke Baker.