If you are one of my Whatsapp contacts, you’ll often have been laughing and trying to translate in annoyance my smartphone’s autocorrect errors in message in equal measures. Sometimes it’s obvious as to the meaning, other times it’s impossible to discern what I was trying to say. The problem is ten times worse when I don’t have my reading glasses on. That’s why you’ll welcome the news that Whatsapp message editing has arrived.
For the moments when you make a mistake, or simply change your mind, you can now edit your sent messages.
From correcting a simple misspelling to adding extra context to a message, Whatsapp message editing will bring you more control over your chats. All you need to do is long-press on a sent message and choose ‘Edit’ from the menu for up to fifteen minutes after you pressed send.
Edited messages will display ‘edited’ alongside them, so those you’re messaging are aware of the correction without showing edit history. As with all personal messages, media and calls, your messages and the edits you make are protected by end-to-end encryption.
The Whatsapp message editing feature has started rolling out to users globally and will be available to everyone in the coming weeks.
Whatsapp message editing comes quite late to the game – Facebook has had it for years and it’s on rival platforms such as Signal and Telegram. Plus if you fancy being a paying Twitter subscriber Tweets can be edited.
