WHATSAPP is making some major changes to voice messages – including some handy tricks for recording notes.
The wildly popular feature is getting a series of changes in an upcoming update.
WhatsApp first launched voice notes back in 2013.
And it says users now send 7billion voice messages on WhatsApp every day on average.
“Voice messages have made it quick and easy for people to have more expressive conversations,” said WhatsApp.
“Showing emotion or excitement through voice is more natural than text.
“And in many situations, voice messages are the preferred form of communication on WhatsApp.”
There are three huge changes, which we’ll detail below.
Out of chat playback
This really does what it says on the tin: you can play messages outside of a chat.
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So if you start listening to a voice message in one conversation, you can leave that chat and talk to someone else.
The voice note will continue playing in the background.
This is especially handy if a voice note is quite long, and you want to keep using WhatsApp without being locked into the same channel.
Pause/resume recording
Another long-demanded feature is the ability to pause and resume recordings.
If you’ve ever recorded a long message, you might recall losing your train of thought.
Alternatively you might get distracted, and want to return to your recording later on.
Whatever the reason, it’s now possible to pause the recording and resume it when you’re ready.
Draft preview
Draft preview is also another long-awaited feature.
It’s simple: you can listen to voice messages before you send them.
That gives you the chance to see if you’ve said something you wish you hadn’t, or to check if your audio quality is good enough.
And if you decide the message isn’t right, you can simply scrap it.
What else…
There are three other changes you might enjoy.
The first is waveform visualisation.
This means the waveform of the voice note appears on the recording, letting you more easily “follow” the message.
Second is the ability to remember playback.
So if you pause while listening to a message, you can come back to it later at the same place.
Finally, there’s the ability to speed up playback on voice messages, including ones that have been forwarded.
You can choose 1.5x or 2x playback options.
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk