Learn about WhatsApp Post-28
Learn about WhatsApp
Send private messages
Your privacy is very important to us. With WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption, your private messages, photos, calls, and more stay between you and the people you choose, meaning not even WhatsApp can see them.
WhatsApp Privacy keeps your conversations safe, no matter what, whether it’s your secrets, complicated arguments, or just a joke.
End-to-end encryption
With WhatsApp’s end-to-end encryption turned on, private messages, calls, photos, and videos are protected with a lock, with only you and the recipient having the special key to unlock and read them.
Extra Layer of Privacy
Beyond end-to-end encryption, WhatsApp applies an extra layer of security to all your conversations.
Control your privacy according to your needs
With WhatsApp’s privacy settings, you can choose what you share, how you appear online, and who can talk to you.
You can lock a chat to add extra privacy to your chats. Locked chats will be hidden from your chat list and placed in the Locked Chats folder.
To read messages in a locked chat, you’ll need to unlock your chat using your device’s authentication, such as your phone’s passcode, Face ID, fingerprint, or a secret code of your choice. When a chat is locked, the content and contact information in the notification will be hidden. The notification will look like this: “WhatsApp: 1 new message.”
Depending on the language you’re using in WhatsApp, the feature may be called ‘Chat Lock’ or ‘Chat Block. Turn Chat Lock on or off
Note: Calls from contacts in a locked chat won’t be blocked. If you restore your WhatsApp backup to a new phone, your locked chat will still be locked. To access your locked chat, you’ll need to set up device authentication.
Create a secret code. You can lock your chats with a secret code that’s different from your phone’s passcode. You must create your own secret code on your Android or iPhone. To view a chat locked with a secret code: Click Locked Chats. Enter your secret code. Click Continue. Viewing and hiding locked chats To view your locked chats, click the Chat lock unlocked icon. Or, you can hide the locked chat folder so that only you can see it if you enter
your secret code. Learn how to hide your locked chat folder on Android and iPhone.
To view hidden locked chats:Click Find.Type your secret code.Click Locked chats.Unlock and delete locked chats
You can unlock and delete all of your locked chats at once. When you unlock and delete locked chats, they are completely deleted and returned to your chat list. This process deletes all messages and media in those chats. If you have a secret code, it will also be deleted.
To unlock and delete locked chats:
Click Settings > Privacy.
Click Chat Locks > Unlock and Delete Locked Chats.
Note: You can restore deleted chats if you had a recent backup before deleting the chats. However, you can only restore messages and media sent before the backup was taken.
Temporary messages are an optional feature that you can turn on for more privacy.
You can set a time period for messages to expire after 24 hours, 7 days, or 90 days if they are not sent. The time period you choose only affects new messages in a chat, not messages you have previously sent or received.
How to use temporary messages
You can turn temporary messages on for all of your chats or for specific chats. In a single chat, either you or the person you are messaging can turn temporary messages on or off. Read this help article to learn how to turn temporary messages on or off.
In group chats, anyone can turn temporary messages on or off by default. However, group admins can change the group settings to allow only admins to turn temporary messages on or off. Read this help article to learn how to turn temporary messages on or off in a group.
You can set temporary messages as the default for new single chats by tapping Settings > Privacy > Default message timer and choosing a time period.
Note:
- You can set the duration of the ephemeral message to 24 hours, 7 days, or 90 days. If you don’t open WhatsApp within the time period you set for the message to disappear, the message will disappear from the chat. However, the message preview may be shown until the person you are messaging opens WhatsApp.
- If an ephemeral message is forwarded to a chat that has ephemeral messages turned off, the message will not disappear from the forwarded chat.
- When you reply to a message on WhatsApp, the original message is quoted in your reply. If you have ephemeral messages turned on, the quoted message may still be visible in the chat after the time period has passed.
- If the user created a backup before the message disappeared, the deleted message will be included in the backup. When a user restores a message from a backup, ephemeral messages will be excluded.
- In some countries, ‘Ephemeral messages’ are not available for payment and order-related messages. However, you can exclude these messages from your previous chats separately.
About left messages
Anyone can leave temporary messages in a group chat to prevent them from being lost, but they must be left before the specified time limit expires.
- A left message is visible to everyone in the conversation and will not disappear from the chat even after its time limit has passed.
- The sender of the message has ultimate control over who can leave the message. You will be notified if someone leaves a message you sent. If you decide to undo your message, no one else in the chat will be able to leave it.
- You have approximately 30 days from the time you left a message to undo it.
Learn more about left messages.
Media in temporary messages
By default, any media you download to WhatsApp will automatically be saved to your Photos folder. However, when temporary messages are turned on, media sent in a chat will be removed from the chat and will not be saved to your Photos.
Anyone with your phone number can call you on WhatsApp. An unknown caller can be someone you haven’t contacted before or saved as a contact. You can change your privacy settings to block a phone number or silence calls from unknown callers.
Silencing calls from unknown callers means you can protect your privacy and prevent unwanted communication while focusing on the conversations that are important to you.
Silencing unknown callers
1.
Tap > Settings > Privacy.
- Tap Calls.
- Turn Silence unknown callers on or off.
You’ll see silenced calls from unknown callers in the Calls tab and in your notifications, but your phone won’t ring. You can call the unknown caller back from within the Calls tab. Or, you can tap the message from the silenced unknown caller in a chat.
Note: If you call or message a silenced caller, you won’t be able to silence their calls in the future. You can stop receiving calls from other WhatsApp users by blocking them.
Related Resources
- How to change your privacy settings
- How to make voice calls
- How to block and report a contact
- ‘Last seen’ and ‘Online’ tell you if a user is online and when they last used WhatsApp. When a user is online, they have WhatsApp open on their device and are connected to the internet. However, this does not mean that the user has read your message.Changing your ‘Last seen’ and ‘Online’You can change who can see your ‘Last seen’ and ‘Online’:1.Tap > Settings > Privacy.
- Tap ‘Last seen’ and ‘Online’.
- Choose Everyone, My contacts, Contacts except these… or No one.
If you can’t see someone’s ‘Last seen’ or ‘Online’
You may not be able to see a contact’s ‘Last seen’ or ‘Online’ for the following reasons:
- You have set your privacy settings to not share your ‘Last seen’ with others. If you don’t share your ‘last seen’, you won’t be able to see other contacts’ ‘last seen’.
- You haven’t previously chatted with them or saved them as a contact.
- You may have been blocked.
- They have set their privacy settings to hide this information.
- They haven’t previously messaged you or saved you as a contact.
- There may be a temporary connection issue. Log out of WhatsApp and log back in to see if that resolves the issue.
Note: When you type, people who are online in a chat with you will be able to see it.
Related resources
- How to change your privacy settings
- A contact’s profile information isn’t visible
