As often with new mobile features, you didn’t know you needed them until they were there, or even just named. Because to tell the truth, the new function of WhatsApp only exists because a button is dedicated to it, that it is called Video message and that until then, nothing prevented the users of the application from sending short videos to their interlocutors.
According wabetainfo, always very well informed on the news of the instant messaging application, WhatsApp should globally roll out a new feature called Video messages. Featured in the latest beta updates for iOS (23.6.0.73) and Android (2.23.8.19), it will share short videos up to 60s in length. The option will be available in the same place as for recording voice messages. By leaving his finger pressed on the microphone icon, it turns into a camera icon and a new press then allows you to start recording.
According to the specialized site, recipients will be notified that the video has just been recorded and is therefore not a video captured in any way with other tools on the phone and sent a posteriori. The idea, in the attention economy we know, is obviously to capture the interest of the recipient with live and unique content.
During Apple’s WWDC, the Mountain View firm presented a related feature for iOS 17. FaceTime users will have the possibility of leaving video messages, like on an answering machine, if the interlocutor has not deigned to answer to a call. We can now bet that most messaging apps will have similar features in the coming months.