WhatsApp users are no longer restricted to using their accounts on just a single phone.
Today, the Meta-owned messaging service has announced its multi-device feature which previously does not allow you to access and send messages from additional Android tablets, browsers, or computers alongside your primary phone, that it is expanding to support additional smartphones.
Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta Company made the announcement today on his official Facebook page, that WhatsApp users can now log into the same account on up to four different devices simultaneously.
Putting up a secondary phone to use with your WhatsApp account happens after doing a fresh install of the app. Except, rather than entering your phone number during setup and logging in as usual, you instead tap a new “link to existing account†option. This will generate a QR code to be scanned by your primary WhatsApp phone via the “link a device†option in settings. The new feature works across both iOS and Android devices.
WhatsApp is ruling out this feature as a useful tool for small businesses that might want multiple employees to be able to send and receive messages from the same business number via different phones. But it should be useful for anyone who uses multiple smartphones regularly and wants them all to be associated with the same WhatsApp account.
Although the original phone that logged in to your account is considered the “primary†device, it doesn’t need to be turned on to receive messages across your other phones.
Also, once a secondary phone is linked to your WhatsApp account, you’ll be able to access and send messages from either phone. Up to a year of messages will sync between devices, so you’ll be able to see chat histories before sending any new messages. Messages sync across phones regardless of their operating systems, whether it’s iOS to Android or vice versa.
However, personal messages remain end-to-end encrypted, regardless of whether you’re using the multi-device feature.