WhatsApp introduces voice/video calls on desktop app

WhatsApp has announced that private and secure one-to-one voice and video calls are now available on WhatsApp’s desktop app.

WhatsApp calls have increased over 50% compared to the previous year. Facebook shared on its blog that over 1.4 billion voice and video calls were made on New Year’s Eve 2020. It is the most ever calls made in a single day on WhatsApp.

“With so many people still apart from their loved ones, and adjusting to new ways of working, we want conversations on WhatsApp to feel as close to in-person as possible, regardless of where you are in the world or the tech you’re using,” stated WhatsApp’s on its official website.

Answering on a bigger screen makes it easier to work with colleagues, see your family more clearly on a bigger canvas, or free up your hands to move around a room while talking.

To make desktop calling more useful, it has been made sure it works seamlessly for both portrait and landscape orientation. It has also made sure that it appears in a resizable standalone window on your computer screen and is set to be always on top so users never lose video chats in a browser tab or stack of open windows.

Voice and video calls on WhatsApp are end-to-end encrypted. Therefore, WhatsApp can’t hear or see them, whether you call from your phone or your computer. At present, the feature is available for one-to-one calls on the desktop.

The feature will be expanding to include group voice and video calls in the future.