WhatsApp is testing a new feature to organize groups for work and school | Technology/Tools

NEW YORK, April 14 – WhatsApp is testing a new feature called Communities to organize groups into larger structures that can be used in workplaces or schools, the Meta Platforms-owned messaging service said today.

WhatsApp Director Will Cathcart said the feature will group groups, limited to 256 users, under larger umbrellas where administrators can send alerts to a community of thousands.

“This is really geared towards the communities that you are already a part of in your life and connect in private,” Cathcart said in an interview with Reuters, citing Slack or Salesforce-owned Microsoft Teams as similar types of connections.

He said there are currently no plans to charge for the new feature, which is being beta-tested with a small number of global communities, but he did not rule out introducing “premium enterprise features” in the future.

The messaging service, which is end-to-end encrypted and has about 2 billion users, said that the Communities feature will also be end-to-end encrypted.

WhatsApp has been plagued by abuse, including mass messaging, spreading false information and hate speech. Cathcart said users will not be able to search for different communities on WhatsApp and will use anti-abuse tools and safeguards such as transfer limits for the new feature.

WhatsApp said it will also make changes to its Groups feature before launching Communities. He said he was adding the ability for group admins to delete problematic messages from everyone’s chat, offer voice calls to up to 32 people, increase file sharing to 2 GB, and add emoji reactions to messages.

Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, said in a post on Thursday that the Communities app will be rolling out over the next few months. He said Meta will create community messaging features for Facebook, Messenger and Instagram.

Meta also plans to roll out end-to-end encryption for other app messaging services as part of its stated focus on privacy. – Reuters