Get the most out of your WhatsApp groups with these tips, they are very simple and will be a great help for those group conversations we are all in.
WhatsApp groups can be very good or very bad, WhatsApp heaven or hell. We all know that they can be very boring, especially those with many members in which the conversation never stops, because the notifications are constant, it is difficult to find the really interesting messages and make you listen.
13 tips for WhatsApp groups
However, WhatsApp group chats can be very positive, and we’ll explain how through the recommendation of 13 tips you should try. After explaining the essential tips for mastering WhatsApp and 3 tips for chatting faster, in this guide we focus only on groups so you can learn how to get the most out of them using the tools WhatsApp currently offers.
Customize notifications to differentiate them
It’s common in WhatsApp to have more than one group, and maybe even more than ten, so you may want to customize the notifications for each of them to know which specific group is the one with news just by listening to the notification tone. Fortunately, from each group’s own settings, you can change this option. Follow these steps:
- Enter the WhatsApp group whose notifications you want to customize.
- Click on the group name to access the configuration menu.
- Tap on the “Customize Notifications” section.
- Check the “Custom Notifications” box and choose the tone, vibration type and color of the notification for that group. This way, when you hear the tone or see the light -if your mobile has a notification LED-, you will know immediately in which group the new messages are.
Enable temporary messages
In March 2021, WhatsApp added temporary messages which, as the name suggests, are messages that automatically disappear after 7 days. Just like you can enable temporary messages in individual chats, you can also do it in group chats.
This way you can send messages, also with audiovisual content, which will be deleted without you doing anything after a week. Here are the steps to follow to activate them in group:
- Enter the group and click on the name to access the settings.
- Scroll down and click on “Temporary Messages”.
- Read the message with the information WhatsApp shows you and click “Continue”.
- On the Temporary Messages page, click the “Enabled” box to enable them. When you want to deactivate them, just repeat the process.
Archive the group so it doesn’t bother you
As we mentioned, WhatsApp groups can be very annoying, especially when notifications keep coming in because there are always people talking. If you don’t want groups to bother you as much, you can choose to archive them so they don’t leave the archived section. So you can do this:
- Press and hold the group you want to archive.
- Press the archive chat option, which appears at the top with the down arrow icon. From now on, you can find it in the “Archived” section.
If you don’t want to be so drastic, turn off notifications
Maybe you don’t want to be so drastic when banning a group to the archive folder, you just want its notifications to not come out constantly. To do this, it’s best to simply silence the notifications of this group, you can even do it forever. That way, you won’t have to worry about silencing the group every now and then. So you can do this:
- Enter the group you want to disable.
- Click on the three-dot button in the upper right corner.
- From the options menu, tap on “Mute Notifications.”
- Choose whether you want to turn off notifications for eight hours, a week, or forever. If you want it to alert you to mentions made by other users, click “Show Notifications.”
Choose other administrators to share responsibility
Although it may not seem like it, being an administrator of a WhatsApp group comes with a lot of responsibility, especially if it has many members. The administrator is responsible for adding new users, checking that everyone is following the rules and deciding who can participate. Fortunately, you can share this responsibility with other members by appointing them as administrators as well:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap the name to access its settings.
- Scroll down and enter “Group Settings”.
- Tap “Designate group administrators”.
- From the list of participants, select the new administrators.
Define who can edit group information
The information of a WhatsApp group is: profile picture, subject, description and the option of temporary messages. This information can be very important for new members, as it lets them know what topics are discussed in the group or what rules prevail in the group. For this reason, it is perhaps best if only administrators can edit it. So you can do this:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap on the name to access its settings.
- Swipe down and enter “Group settings”.
- Tap on “Edit group information”.
- Click on “Administrators only”. If you want all members to be able to continue editing this information, keep the “All Participants” option turned on
Limit member participation
This tip for WhatsApp groups goes the same way as the previous one, as it consists of limiting the members’ options to keep the group in order. As we said at the beginning, it can be hard to find the really interesting messages in groups where the conversation never stops.
For this reason it can be a good idea to limit member participation so that only administrators can write. For example, this feature is interesting in groups of a more serious nature, such as a conversation with colleagues focused on sharing strictly professional information. Here’s how it can be enabled:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap the name to access its settings.
- Swipe down and enter “Group Settings”.
- Tap on “Send Messages”.
- Select “Administrators only”.
Invite new members more comfortably
WhatsApp only supports groups of up to 256 members for a specific reason. While that’s not the 200,000 members that Telegram allows, it’s a number that can get uncomfortable if you have to add one by one to each member. Therefore, WhatsApp has added the ability to invite other users into your group via a link.
By simply clicking on the link, the users you shared it with can easily enter. So you can get this link and share it to invite new members:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap on the name to access its settings.
- Tap on “Group invitation link”.
- Choose whether you want to copy the link to share it on other platforms or send it directly via WhatsApp. You can also get a QR code that the user accesses directly by scanning it with their mobile.
Find out who is paying attention to your messages
Even if group members have disabled read confirmation, in WhatsApp groups you can see who has read your messages and who hasn’t. This way you can find out who is really paying attention to what you share. It’s very simple, just follow these steps:
- Enter the WhatsApp group.
- Press for a few seconds on the message you want to investigate.
- Click on the three-dot button in the upper right corner.
- In the options menu, press “Info”.
- Check which users have read your message.
Hide media files in the gallery
Multimedia files shared by WhatsApp groups can be somewhat conflicting, so perhaps the best thing to do is to block their presence in your mobile gallery. The messaging platform has a specific tool for this, so you can use it:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap on the name to access its settings.
- Tap on “Visibility of multimedia files”.
- Select “No” to prevent the group’s photos and videos from appearing in your phone’s gallery.
Quickly find a shared video, document or photo
Going back to groups where a lot of information is shared, finding a specific message can be a daunting task, whether it’s a text, photo or link. Going through the entire conversation until you find what you’re looking for doesn’t seem like a good plan, so it’s best to access the group’s repository where all shared images, documents and links are stored. So you can do this:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap on the name to access its settings.
- Go to “Files, links and docs”.
- Tap on “Files”, “Documents” or “Links” depending on the type of content you want to search for and proceed to search.
Choose who can add you to groups
Since 2019, WhatsApp allows you to control who can add you to groups, a very interesting tool if they tend to add you to conversations that you are not interested in at all. Of course, even if you set up that only your contacts can add you, the group administrators will still have the option to invite you via private message, so you can at least think about whether you want to accept or not.
To choose who can add you to WhatsApp groups, follow this process:
- Open WhatsApp and click the three-dot button in the upper right corner.
- In the options menu, tap on “Settings”.
- Go to “Account” and then to “Privacy”.
- Press the “Groups” option.
- Select who can add you to groups: “Everyone”, “My contacts” or “My contacts, except…” with some exceptions you can choose yourself.
Get the attention of the user you are addressing directly
One of the most useful tools WhatsApp has added in recent years are mentions, which allow you to directly get the attention of the user you’re addressing so your message doesn’t go unnoticed.
Mentioning someone in a WhatsApp group is very simple, just write the @ and select the user you want to mention from the list that appears. Then write and send the message so that WhatsApp informs them that your message is specifically addressed to them.
Notify WhatsApp of violations in the group
The final WhatsApp group tip we want to recommend is one that serves to notify the platform that its rules are being violated. This way, WhatsApp will analyze the last five messages shared in the group chat to determine if it needs to take any action on it. You can rest easy when reporting a group, as no member will be notified. So you can do this:
- Enter the WhatsApp group and tap the name to access its settings.
- Scroll down to the bottom of the page and tap on “Report Group”.
- Confirm your decision by tapping the “Report” option.
And so far, our guide with the best tips you can use for your WhatsApp groups. Without a doubt, they will help you master them a little more and also make them less annoying, why not say so. Don’t forget that you can also put into practice the best tips for WhatsApp Status and make the most of this very interesting feature of the platform.
