WhatsApp’s impending support for video calling appears to
be closer to launch. According to news reports, the feature is now functional
in some of the beta builds of the Android application, following its recent
arrival in the Windows Phone version of the Facebook-owned messaging app.
The
iOS app was also updated just last week, but video calling support was not
included at that time.
The arrival of
video calling on Android was first spotted by the blog Android Police,
which found that some users on the beta builds of the application were able to
access video calling through an updated app interface.
For those on a
version of WhatsApp which includes video calling support, you’re able to tap
the call button or tap on a contact card to kick off a video call. In this
case, a new dialog box will appear, offering the choice between a standard
voice call and a video call. In addition, the call log will show which calls
were made via video by annotating them with the camera icon, instead of the
telephone icon.
However,
there isn’t yet a way to call other WhatsApp users who don’t also have video
calling support. If you try to, WhatsApp defaults to a voice call.
Android
isn’t the only platform where video calling has been switched on. Last
week, some users on the WhatsApp beta for
Windows Phone were also surprised to find that the feature was
now functional. And in this case, it didn’t require an app update – indicating
a server-side change could enable it.
In
the Windows Phone beta, video calls worked the same as on Android. When
you tapped the call button, you could pick between voice and video. During
calls, you can also mute the call or switch cameras, early adopters noted.
Before you get too excited, let’s remember that this is
not the first time Android users were randomly able to use video calling. A beta build released
in May had
turned this option on then, but WhatsApp later removed it.
That being
said, WhatsApp in the past has trialled big updates to its apps in a similar
fashion. For example, it was a couple of months before voice calling went from testing on
Android to being publicly
available on the platform, and then another month before it went live on iOS.
What is
interesting is that it’s taken this long to bring the feature to WhatsApp’s 1 billion users,
given the messaging service now has access to resources and the technical
know-how from parent company Facebook, which switched on free, VOIP
video calls in April 2015.
In any event,
the timing is ripe for a video calling launch on WhatsApp, assuming it wants to
remain competitive.
Source: Tech Crunch
N.B: If you don’t want to
wait, you can download the APK for WhatsApp beta version 2.16.381 from APK Mirror to give it a spin.
No comments:
Post a Comment