WhatsApp dark mode and swipe to reply may finally come to Android

WhatsApp, the world’s most popular IP-based messaging app, has got many new features recently. This year, WhatsApp has developed new group managing features such as user search, the ability for group administrators to restrict members of a group from sending messages, a mute feature, a “Mark as Read” shortcut button for notifications, picture-in-picture mode, group voice and video calling, and more.

I’m happy to exclusively give the good news: WhatsApp is finally working on a Dark Mode! It’s a dream 😍
There are many important secret references in recent updates!

Be patient to see it out, hoping it will be FULL OLED friendly for Android phones, iPhone X and newer!

— WABetaInfo (@WABetaInfo) September 14, 2018

Now, WABetaInfo states that WhatsApp is finally working on a dark mode in Android, as many important secret references were found in recent updates. As of now, it’s unknown whether it will be a full black mode that could improve power efficiency in smartphones with OLED displays.

WABetaInfo was also able to discover that WhatsApp is developing a Swipe to Reply feature. It’s not available in the latest WhatsApp 2.18.282 beta version as it needs to get many improvements before being enabled for users, but WABetaInfo posted a GIF explaining how it works. This feature exists in WhatsApp for iOS since a few years. It enables users to quickly reply to a message using a swipe gesture. The swipe gesture is better than the alternative gesture which WhatsApp recently implemented in Android, in which users had to tap and hold the message and then type to reply.

With the new swipe to reply feature, WhatsApp will automatically load the message in the reply context as soon as the user swipes the message. As of now, it’s unknown when WhatsApp plans to launch this feature for all users, but WABetaInfo is confident that the company will remotely enable it “very soon.”

Finally, the latest WhatsApp beta now shows a More button if there are more than 10 participants in a group. The More button will present the full group participants list.