WhatsApp routinely sends app updates to enhance the user experience. Granted,we’re not always on boardwith some of the developers' decisions, but in general,WhatsApphas done a decent job of staying in sync withrival messaging apps, especially considering the volume of people who use it every day. Since last year, the chat app has allowed users to send emoji reactions while replying to a Status on Android. The Meta-owned app is now working on improving this feature just a touch by enabling people to send their avatars as reactions as well.
Just like emoji reactions, you can pick from a total of eight avatars perWABetaInfo. The feature was supposedly enabled on version2.23.18.9of WhatsApp beta for Android. But unlike most other WhatsApp betas, this one doesn’t appear to be widely rolling out to testers just yet, the site claims.
When widely available, users should be able to switch to avatar reactions with an option right next to the existing set of emoji reactions, as shown above. The most commonly used set of reactions can be seen in the screenshot, though we only see six here and not eight, as mentioned by the site.
There’s no doubt that avatars offer a more personal touch as compared to basic emoji reactions, so we expect this feature to eventually become available to beta testers before hitting the stable version somewhere down the line.
Although you can pick up WhatsApp for Android beta v2.23.18.9 via the Google Play Store now, the visibility of this new avatar reactions feature is not guaranteed, as I found out. Nevertheless, this is a decent visual overhaul of WhatsApp Status reactions and one that frequent users would like to engage with.
Among the more recent additions to WhatsApp’s ever-growing list of features was anew animationwhen switching between video and audio messages or vice versa. Meanwhile, the chat app finally started letting users sharehigh-resolution photosandHD videoswith their contacts, which are good options to have when sending compressed (low-quality) imagery or videos is not feasible.
