Avatars, or customisable characters, are being rolled out on WhatsApp, a feature that’s already available on Facebook and Instagram.
Like Apple’s Memoji, which iPhone users can paste into WhatsApp chats in the form of expressive stickers, WhatsApp’s avatars are caricatures of the user. But there is a difference: Avatars have bodies for outfits (Memoji revolves around facial expressions) and there will be “diverse hairstyles” and “facial features”.
The feature has been rolling out to beta testers for a couple of months on both Android and iOS since at least October, according to WABetaInfo. Now they will become available for all users on mobile.
“Sending an avatar is a fast and fun way to share feelings with friends and family. It can also be a great way to represent yourself without using your real photo so it feels more private,” reads a statement from Meta.
The company has said that avatars can be used as a profile picture on the messaging service or sent in the form of one of 36 custom stickers.
The trend of avatars became popular with Bitmoji, the 2D characters now owned by Snap while Apple and Samsung offer avatars in the form of Memoji and AR Emoji respectively. But avatars may have the maximum impact because of Meta, which wants the feature to be integral to the metaverse experience.
The other interesting feature WhatsApp has announced recently is Message Yourself, which allows users to send notes, reminders and shopping lists to themselves on WhatsApp. Users will see their contact at the top of the contacts list on WhatsApp when they create a new chat. Tapping that contact will take them to the chat screen they can use to send messages to themselves. So far, users have been using a workaround to send messages to themselves.WhatsApp rival Signal has a feature called Note to Self that addresses the same use case.