Ephemeral updates or "stories" have become a crucial part of almost every major social networking or messaging app. WhatsApp is no different, and it rolled out the ability to share 24-hour viewable status updates in the form of text, photos, GIFs, or videos a few years ago. The Meta-owned messaging service is now further improving status updates in a big way with additions like voice status, the ability to react to a status, link previews, and more. This is the first massive update for status updates on WhatsApp since their initial rollout.

Firstly, you can now make your WhatsApp status updates more private than before and share them with only selected contacts. You can share your ephemeral updates with My contacts except... a few people in your WhatsApp list or Only share with a few desired friends and family members. WhatsApp will automatically use your most recent selection as the default choice for your future status updates. This feature was first spotted in development in WhatsApp beta for Android in September 2022. It also builds on the new privacy features WhatsApp rolled out for your online status back in August 2022.

Secondly, the messaging service will now let you share voice notes of up to 30 seconds as status updates. If you feel you can express yourself better with your voice instead of typing, voice status updates are for you. First references to this feature popped up in July 2022.

Status Update improvements in WhatsApp
Source: WhatsApp

Third, WhatsApp status updates are gaining status reactions. The company says this was the most requested feature from its users after it debuted message reactions in 2022. To send a reaction, open a status, swipe up, and select one of the eight available emoji.

Fourth, a status profile ring will appear around a contact's profile picture whenever they share a new status update. This will be visible everywhere across the app, so you can quickly know when that particular contact has shared a new ephemeral update.

Lastly, WhatsApp status updates are gaining support for link previews. So, whenever a friend or family member shares a link as a status, you can see a visual preview without having to open it first.

WhatsApp is rolling out these updates to all its users worldwide over the coming weeks.