Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge
WhatsApp has recently released a preview feature for voice messages, letting you check whether your ramblings vaguely make sense before inflicting them on others. The Meta-owned messaging service said that the feature has been slowly rolling out in recent weeks, and that it’s now available across all platforms including iOS, Android, web, and desktop.
According to a help page for the feature, the option to preview a voice message appears after you press the stop button to finish a recording. You can then preview it with the triangular play icon, delete it with the trash can icon, or send it with the send button.
They’re not mistakes, they’re rehearsals. Now you can preview your voice messages before you hit send. pic.twitter.com/ohnEVrGTvD
— WhatsApp (@WhatsApp) December 14, 2021
Audio previews are one part of a flurry of new updates that have either been released or are reportedly in development around WhatsApp’s voice message feature. Earlier this year, the service added the ability to adjust the playback speed of voice notes during listening (perfect for quickly getting through long and rambling messages), and WABetaInfo reports that it’ll also soon be possible to pause and resume recording of a voice message. We’ve been able to verify that the latter feature is available in the beta version of WhatsApp for iOS.
But more interesting features may be on the horizon. In September, WhatsApp confirmed it was in the early stages of developing a new voice transcription feature that could one day allow you to read a transcription of a voice message rather than listening to it. Then, in October, WABetaInfo reported that it had also found signs of a “global voice message player” feature that would let users listen to voice notes while browsing other WhatsApp chats.
There’s no information available as to when (or even if, in some cases) WhatsApp may roll out these new voice message features. But being able to preview a voice note before sending it is a promising start.