WhatsApp Doubles Number of Video Chat Participants

It's still end-to-end encrypted, too

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Published on April 28, 2020 01:20PM EDT

WhatsApp end-to-end encryption makes sure your video calls are secure, and now you can have twice as many people in them.

Eight video chat participants on WhatsApp mobile — WhatsApp

WhatsApp has doubled the number of possible simultaneous video chat participants to eight to help more people connect during pandemic stay-at-home orders.

Encryption: WhatsApp features end-to-end encryption, which means that your video (and text) chats are all secure from prying eyes, even those at Facebook-owned WhatsApp itself. The app is available on iOS and Android devices and works well on slower networks, making it a good alternative to other encrypted solutions, like the Apple-only FaceTime.

Competition: The aforementioned FaceTime allows up to 32 people to chat at once, while Zoom (not encrypted end-to-end) claims up to 1,000 participants at a time. Skype has a 50 person limit, Google Hangouts allows up to 10 (or 25 if you're a paid business user), and Facebook Rooms allows 50 people at a time to chat. Like Zoom, none of these solutions are end-to-end encrypted, however.

Bottom line: In our stay-at-home, virtual presence reality, having a secure video chat app that can work across devices and networks is an important option. Now that WhatsApp allows for more than a paltry four users at a time, it might become your new favorite way to stay in touch.

Via: 9to5Mac