WhatsApp introduced the ability to send disappearing messages on its platform in late 2020. The company then further refined the feature by allowing you to enable disappearing messages by default for all new chats. It also added new time options after which a message would expire: from as short as 24 hours to as long as 7 days. But there could be situations when you want to save a disappearing message for future reference. WhatsApp is now making this possible with "Keep In Chat."

With this new WhatsApp feature, you can bookmark a disappearing message or media for future access. But when you do so, the sender will be notified, and they will have to approve this action. If they don't give their consent, the message will expire after its pre-specified time.

This way, WhatsApp's implementation ensures that its Keep In Chat feature does not ruin disappearing messages' privacy and security benefits. The sender will always have the final say on whether their message can be saved or not.

Messages that you can save will appear in the WhatsApp chat with a bookmark icon, which will be visible to you and the original sender. Additionally, you can access them from the Kept Messages folder, where they are organized based on conversations.

WhatsApp was spotted working on a veto for disappearing messages as far back as May 2022. While the Meta-owned messaging platform was recently also found working on 15 new time duration options for disappearing messages, they are not a part of today's announcement.

Keep in Chat will roll out globally to all WhatsApp users in the coming weeks. In case you are not sure how to use send messages that expire after a pre-specified time, check out our guide on how to send disappearing messages on WhatsApp.