There are times where you want to send across a message or a video but you don’t want the recipient to see it more than once. That’s pretty much the reason why Snapchat was invented. However, the concept has since been picked up by various other applications, and Facebook-owned WhatsApp is the latest one to jump on the disappearing messages bandwagon.
It’s pretty straightforward; images and videos sent using the View Once feature can only be opened once by the recipient. There’s no media preview. Instead, there’s a text-sized bubble that will say whether it’s an image or a video that’s been sent.
The first time you open a ‘View Once’ image or video, you’ll get this explainer.
Keep in mind that the recipient can still screenshot the message or video, or record it using another phone. So, it’s not completely safe if you were planning to send extremely sensitive data.
Tap on the ‘View Once’ icon within the caption box to enable the feature.
The feature is currently available in the WhatsApp beta (version 2.21.14.3) and doesn’t require the recipient to be on the same version so you’ll be able to send disappearing messages to people using an older version. If you’re not on the beta channel, you can sideload the update from APK Mirror.
