Great news for those of you who use WhatsApp with Android devices. Our beloved instant messaging app has been further updated and this new 2.16.256 Beta version comes with the addition of giant emoticons. For the moment these new giant emoticons are active only in the Beta version of WhatsApp for Android, but we are confident that they will soon be available in a stable version of the app.
That said, let’s see what you have to do to use these new giant emoticons. First (and most important) step: how many emoticons are you going to include in your message? In fact, the size of the emoticons will depend on the number of them. So, if you use four or more emoticons, they will be displayed in their normal size. If you insert just two smileys they will be bigger and, obviously, if you insert just one emoticon, it will be extra-large! We are sure that WhatsApp users will really enjoy using these new giant emoticons.
How can you you install this latest 2.16.256 Beta version of WhatsApp on your Android device? Being a Beta, this latest updated version of WhatsApp is currently available on the Google Play Store only for Beta Testers, but don’t worry, you can easily become one of them. How? Just open this link which will bring you to the Google Play Store webpage. Once you’ve opened it, tap on the “BECOME A TESTER” button. Now you can open the official Android Store and search for WhatsApp 2.16.256. Once you have found it, you can install it on your Android device and, after the installation is complete, you will be finally able to use this new giant emoticons.
If you regularly use WhatsApp, you are probably a little bit concerned about some recent news. We are talking about the decision of WhatsApp to share data with Facebook. Probably you were on holiday and have missed the news, so let’s recap what happened. On the 25th of August the company announced this decision through a blog post, explaining that “Today, we’re updating WhatsApp’s terms and privacy policy for the first time in four years, as part of our plans to test ways for people to communicate with businesses in the months ahead,”
In the blog post, the company also added that “The updated documents also reflect that we’ve joined Facebook and that we’ve recently rolled out many new features, like end-to-end encryption, WhatsApp Calling, and messaging tools like WhatsApp for web and desktop.” stating also that “But by coordinating more with Facebook, we’ll be able to do things like track basic metrics about how often people use our services and better fight spam on WhatsApp. And by connecting your phone number with Facebook’s systems, Facebook can offer better friend suggestions and show you more relevant ads if you have an account with them.”
As we said above, the news has created a lot of debate and doesn’t seem to be very appreciated by WhatsApp users. But, luckily, if you don’t want your phone number to be shared with Facebook, there is a solution. In fact there is a way to opt out when you agree to the updated Terms of Service and Privacy Policy of WhatsApp. If you have already clicked ‘agree’ you can still opt out, because you have 30 days starting from the day you agreed to the updates to do it. You just have to open WhatsApp and go to Settings > Account and then tap on the switch next to Share my Account Info. At this point simply press Don’t share.