WhatsApp in ‘vacation mode’: what is it and how to activate the function to keep chats archived

After the last improvements made to calls and video calls, and while we wait for multi-device mode reaches the stable version, WhatsApp has added another function in which I had been working for several years: vacation mode.

But make no mistake, because it does not come with that name. Is called ‘Keep chats archived’ and it allows us, as its name suggests, to keep archived chats hidden, even when we receive a message in them. We are going to explain how this new function is activated, which comes just in time for all those who start their rest period in August.

As useful for the work group as for private conversations

It was in 2018 when began to speculate with the possibility that WhatsApp included a “vacation mode”. The idea was that, when activated, the chats that had been silenced (the one at work, for example) kept archived despite receiving new messages.

A few months later it was learned that this function it wouldn’t be called “vacation mode”, but would receive a more neutral and descriptive name: “ignore archived chats” or something similar. Also, it would not apply to muted chats, but to archived ones.

Finally the function ended landing in the beta of WhatsApp last May and now has started to unfold in the stable version of the application. Thanks to this new feature, archived chats will no longer be unarchived automatically after receiving a new message, as has been the case up to now.

And how is it activated? Very simple, once the chats in question are archived, you just have to touch the icon with the three dots at the top, enter ‘Settings’> ‘Chats’ and check the box ‘Keep chats archived’. From there, all the chats that you archive, whether individual or group, will not return to the main screen even if there is a new message in any of them. You will not receive their notifications either, of course.

Another option is to enter the WhatsApp Archives section at the top of the chats. There are all the individual chats and groups that you have archived, you just have to click on the icon with the three dots, tap on ‘Archiving Settings’ and activate the box ‘Keep chats archived’.

Therefore, we are not facing a vacation mode as such (although you see it written like that out there), but it is a function that will be very useful if do you want to “pause” a WhatsApp group because you don’t need it for a season. And nothing prevents you from using it also to hide some private conversation from the main chat list.

More information | WhatsApp

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WhatsApp in ‘vacation mode’: what is it and how to activate the function to keep chats archived

was originally published in

Engadget Android

by
Laura Sacristan

.