Whatsapp has rolled out video calling feature for all its users, including those in India starting November 15th 2016. Just like Google Hangouts, Facetime, Duo and Skype, Whatsapp users would be able to make video calls over the Internet. The feature which was introduced only today will be rolled out to 180 countries in a matter of hours.
According to an official Whatsapp statement, India has more than 160 million users of its service, making the country its largest market the world over.
A good thing about the new Whatsapp video calling feature is that unlike a few other services which are data intensive and require a high-speed, uninterrupted connection, the Whatsapp video call service has been optimized for Indian data conditions. The service, according to Whatsapp’s claims will work with patchy networks and even on below par connections.
The company wants to make the service “available to everyone, and not just those who can afford the most expensive new phones or live in countries with the best cellular networks,” according to an official statement. Underlining its commitment to make the video calling feature work on all sorts of networks, the company said that its “obsessed” with making voice and video work even on low-end phones.
Video calls on Whatsapp will be fully encrypted end-to-end securing privacy for users and making it almost impossible for anyone to tap into the conversations. Whatsapp will roll out on all major smartphone platforms including iPhone, Android, and Windows on a global basis.
Making a video call on Whatsapp is simple. Just press the call button a person’s profile and you’ll get an option to make voice or video calls. Once you choose the ‘video call’ option, you will be able to see the person on the other side once he picks up. If you click on the profile image of the contact, you will get a video camera icon option to make a video call directly (demonstrated in the lead image of this story)
We tried the service within our office over a 4mbps wi-fi connection, and the video quality looked pretty impressive. We will get you a detailed report on the service using it over a variety of networks and data connectivity levels in the next few days.
If, however, the new feature is not available on your Whatsapp application, you can get access to it by following the steps provided below
- Find Whatsapp on Google Play and open it. In all likelihood, you will immediately get an option to update right there. If not…
- Scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page
- You’ll find a section that says “Become a beta tester” – choose “I’m in”
- Follow the instructions and wait for a couple of minutes
- Now get back to the Whatsapp Application page on Google Play
- You will now get an option to update WhatsApp to a beta version
- Update the app and you’re good to go
Do share your experience with the new video calling feature using the comments section below, or through one of our social channels.
