For several months, the social distancing measures issued to curb the spread of the coronavirus pandemic forced a shift in professional and social exchanges. That period saw significant growth in social media use. It was also the opportunity for platforms to get an accurate feel of users’ needs and try to solve them. With the current upgrades and more to come, Whatsapp is responding to users’ suggestions. 

Messenger platform Whatsapp announced Thursday (April 5) new improvements to its platform; 512 people can now be added to Whatsapp groups, twice the number that was previously allowed. In addition, from 100MB previously, the max size of files users can send through end-to-end encryption is increased to 2GB.  

In Africa, WhatsApp's latest upgrades are opportune for several players, including online businesses, educational institutions, professional groups, trade unions, NGOs, and political parties.

In its blog post announcing the upgrades, WhatsApp explained that they are in line with its vision to enable “organizations, businesses, and other close-knit groups to communicate securely and get things done.” 

This year, it made significant improvements to its platform to make it more useful. In March, the messenger platform introduced new voice message options. For instance, users can listen to voice messages out of the chat where they were sent. That way, they can multitask and reply to other chats. They can also pause the voice messages they are recording or listen to them before sending. 

 In April, the "Community" feature was introduced to “bring together separate groups under one umbrella.” 

The platform is also developing several features to take into account the suggestions made by its users during the Coronavirus pandemic that had a notable impact on social and professional exchanges. 

Muriel Edjo