WhatsApp is used by more than 1 billion people in over 180 countries to stay in touch with friends and family, anytime and anywhere. WhatsApp is free and offers simple, secure, reliable messaging. During the course of usage, you will receive so many photos and videos from your contacts as they try to share fun moments, keep you a loop or share a viral video. No storage is big enough if you keep adding files to it, soon your storage will run out and you will need to delete some files to create space. But what if you accidentally delete those files you wanted to keep! How can you re-download WhatsApp photos and videos you accidentally deleted?
WhatsApp previously didn’t allow re-downloading of media files after they were deleted as they disappeared from WhatsApp servers as soon as they were downloaded. You had to inform the sender to resend the photo or video so that you can access it again. Sometimes the sender might have deleted it too and that meant you can’t have that cool pic or video you accidentally deleted.
The good news is, WhatsApp has quietly rolled out a new feature that lets Android users re-download photos, videos, GIFs, audio clips, and documents they deleted. WhatsApp will now store these files permanently and Android users having the new update will be able to retrieve WhatsApp media files from existing chats anytime even after users accidentally, or deliberately delete them.
I know what you thinking, privacy! Well, WhatsApp offers end-to-end encryption (meaning no one, including WhatsApp itself, can see your stored stuff as it is scrambled). But with the recent saga of Facebook and Cambridge Analytical, some people may still have doubts about how secure their data will be.
The feature is obviously a good addition to the already feature packed instant messenger app that is used by so many people. In the past days, you had up to a month to download a file that was sent to you or risk losing it. But with the new update, you can download the file whenever you feel like.
Important Note:
The re-downloading option is only available for files from chats that have not been deleted. This means that if you binned the original conversation, then all its content will have vanished with it. But if they can store media files forever, why can’t they store conversation threads too so we can access this all without any worry?
Now that you have noted that, here is how to re-download the photos and videos that you accidentally deleted.
1. Open WhatsApp and go to the main Chats screen.
2. Locate the thread that contains the file you are after and open it.
3. Scroll up to where you had received the file and just tap on it to save it to your phone.
It’s as easy as that. We’ve shared WhatsApp tips and tricks like how to hide your number and use WhatsApp anonymously, how to read a WhatsApp message without the sender knowing, how to send a WhatsApp message without touching your phone and many more. But this seems to be the easiest so far. With this addition, WhatsApp is trying to rival Telegram, which recently reached 200 million monthly users. Telegram keeps all messages, photos, videos —anything sent via its application forever and users can access it anytime. Think of it as cloud storage for your stuff. But as the Facebook owned application evolves, we all hope it’s for the best.
