After much anticipation, popular messaging app WhatsApp has finally rolled out voice and video call support for its desktop app on Thursday, a big relief for those who are sitting most of the time in front of their computers and working on WhatsApp web, thanks to the work from home environment.
In a tweet today, WhatsApp announced end-to-end encrypted voice and video calls for its desktop app version and also shared a link to download the app on your computer.
“Sometimes you just need a little more space. Secure and reliable, end-to-end encrypted voice and video calls are now available on our desktop app,” the Facebook-owned messaging app tweeted.
You can enable the new WhatsApp feature by downloading the desktop app from here.
WhatsApp said its nearly five-year-old desktop app for Mac and Windows will only support one-to-one calls for now, but that it will be expanding this feature to include group voice and video calls “in the future,” suggested reports.
Earlier, WABetaInfo, a website that tracks all the new features and enhancements in the beta version of the instant messaging application, had shared a screenshot of the two options of both voice-calling and video-calling in the chat header of the WhatsApp Web.
The report said that in terms of receiving calls, WhatsApp Web users will get a pop up every time someone calls. This pop up will have some basic details such as caller ID and two buttons to either accept or decline the call. Once accepted or while the user is on the call, the pop up will be minimized to a much smaller pop-up window with the option to cut the call or switch from audio to video call or vice versa.
WhatsApp voice and video calls have seen a boom since the last one year due to the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns to curb the spread. This led to a complete overhaul of the work scenario in the world where most were asked to work and coordinate from home instead of coming to the office. The new feature of voice and video calls in the desktop version of the app will aim to take on its rival videos calling apps like Zoom, Google Meet etc.
