By Adedapo Adesanya
Popular chat app, WhatsApp, has released the “Always” mute feature for users. The feature is available for Android and iOS users and will allow users to mute the notifications of a WhatsApp chat or a group forever.
Earlier, the messaging platform used to provide three mute options – 8 Hours, 1 Week and 1 Year, but now, instead of a year, one can mute a chat permanently.
It noted that this new feature is available for everyone on both Android and iOS devices as well as the web version.
WhatsApp has been testing the Always mute option for a long time, and now it has finally released it for its users. It is worth noting that once you mute a chat, you will receive messages sent to the group, but your phone will not vibrate or make noise when they’re received.
So, if you do not wish to receive notifications of a WhatsApp chat or a group, you can choose to mute it. Here check the step-by-step guide.
How to mute WhatsApp chats
Open the WhatsApp chat you wish to mute, then tap the group subject. You can also swipe the group to the left in the Chats tab. Then tap More > Mute. You will get three options – 8 Hours, 1 Week and Always. Select the length of time you would like to mute notifications for. Your WhatsApp chat will be muted.
WhatsApp brings new features quite often to enhance the experience of its users. It had recently rolled out an ability to search for a specific contact, then choose the type of media and add keywords to look through past chats and messages.
In other app-related matters, Facebook, which owns the app, said on Thursday that it will start charging companies for some its WhatsApp Business chat services.
WhatsApp Business allows small and medium businesses to chat with customers, provide support and sell products directly. Facebook said it will soon offer services like hosting to help partners manage chat messages with clients, inventory and more.
WhatsApp Business has more than 50 million business users with 175 million people around the world messaging a business each day.
Facebook has struggled to generate meaningful revenue from WhatsApp, which it acquired for $16 billion in 2014 and primarily relies on advertising on Facebook and Instagram to generate revenue.
Facebook said it will use some of the revenue from business sales to continue to offer free services to its more than two billion WhatsApp users.
