WhatsApp announces changes and says they'll be rolled out for everyone in weeks

WhatsApp, owned by Facebook's parent company Meta, has outlined three significant updates set to be rolled out in the coming weeks. The messaging app introduced voice chats for up to 32 people last year and is now extending this capacity to video calls.

The new update will allow 32 participants to join a video call simultaneously. Additionally, WhatsApp is introducing a speaker spotlight feature, which automatically highlights and brings to the forefront of the screen whoever is speaking during the call.

Screen sharing for audio is another feature being added to the platform. "As more and more people have relied on our products to make calls over the years, we've been working on new ways to ensure all calls have a solid audio quality," said Meta.

For comparison, Google Meet allows up to 100 participants for Standard/Essentials Starter/Essentials accounts, 150 for Business Standard/Enterprise Essentials accounts, and 250 for Teaching and Learning Upgrade accounts. Apple's Facetime also supports up to 32 people on video calls, while Zoom allows 100 participants for Basic and Pro accounts, increasing to 300 for Business and 500 for Enterprise accounts.

These features are expected to be available to all WhatsApp users "over the next few weeks". The service also emphasised its ongoing commitment to audio and video quality, promising clearer calls regardless of location, reports Birmingham Live.

The recent launch of its MLow audio codec was highlighted, which is expected to enhance call reliability and quality, regardless of the strength of your connection. This means that calls on mobile devices will benefit from improved noise and echo cancellation, while video calls will have a higher resolution for those with fast connections.

In a blog post detailing each change, it further states that the audio should be crisper.