GB WhatsApp Features Explained: What You Can Customize and Control

Privacy is the category most people come for. The official app lets you hide last seen and read receipts for everyone or for chosen contacts. Modified builds usually split these into finer-grained toggles.

• Hide blue ticks so contacts are not told you have read a message, including in some builds only for selected chats.
• Hide online status or freeze last seen, which keeps your activity less visible without turning off the setting for yourself.
• Hide typing or recording indicators so the other person does not see you composing a reply.
• App lock, an in-app PIN, pattern or fingerprint prompt that stops someone opening your chats from an unlocked phone.
• Anti-delete options that keep a copy of a message the sender later removes for everyone.

Our privacy settings guide walks through where these usually live and how to combine them sensibly.

Appearance options are the most visible difference. Many builds include a built-in theme library, plus controls for colors in the chat list, header and message bubbles.

• Themes that can be downloaded, applied and sometimes edited or shared.
• Fonts and text styles for the interface or for chat text.
• Chat bubble styles and tick styles, which change how messages are drawn.
• Custom launcher icons so the app looks different on your home screen.

If this is what interests you, the theme guide covers the process step by step. A practical tip: change one thing at a time. If the app starts behaving oddly after a heavy theme, you will know what to undo.

Several additions are aimed at people who use messaging for work or manage lots of conversations.

Automation and scheduling

Auto-reply sends a preset response when you are away, and scheduled messages deliver a note at a time you choose. Imagine a small shop owner who wants to send an opening-hours message each morning and an "I'll reply tomorrow" note overnight. These two tools cover that without any extra app.

Sending to many people

Broadcast-style tools let you send one message to a list of contacts without creating a group. Quick-reply shortcuts and message-search helpers are also common. A do-not-disturb mode can silence the app without changing the phone's global settings.

The official app compresses photos and videos and caps how many images you can attach at once. Modified builds often relax some of those limits.

• Sending more images in a single batch.
• Sharing original-quality media with less compression.
• Sending larger files than the official app normally allows.

The exact limits are decided by the build and by the servers handling the transfer, so they can change or fail without warning. Larger files also use more mobile data and storage. The current package is about 78 MB and expects Android 6.0 or higher, so keep a little free space for the media you send and receive.

Status is another area with extra options. Some builds let you save other people's photo and video statuses directly from the viewer, and some allow longer video statuses than the official limit.

Others offer a second account on the same phone, which is how some people keep a personal and a work number separate. Language packs and in-app search shortcuts round out the list. Saving someone else's status is convenient, but think about whether they would expect it.

To browse the full catalog, see the features overview. Note that listing a feature there describes what some builds offer, not a guarantee for the file you install.

More controls come with more things to consider. The app is made by third parties, not WhatsApp LLC or Meta, and it is not on Google Play. WhatsApp has stated that accounts using unofficial clients may be temporarily or permanently restricted. For many people the official app from Google Play remains the safest-supported choice; our comparison article lays out the differences side by side.

If you do choose to use it, a few habits reduce the downside:

1. Get the installer only from a source you trust, and check its size and version against the site's release data.
2. Do not use a number you cannot afford to lose.
3. Keep a regular copy of your chats; the backup guide explains how.
4. Avoid sharing sensitive information through any modified client.