WhatsApp seems to be focusing on pushing new features to its users more than ever and we have been tracking down a bunch of new ones that are on their way. Recently we heard that Facebook chief executive officer Mark Zuckerberg is planning to unify the messaging infrastructure of WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook Messenger services and incorporate end-to-end encryption to these apps.

Another report said that to universally preserve end-to-end encryption poses a whole additional set of critical challenges for Facebook. While the integration is going to take a while, we are expecting a variety of features heading their way to WhatsApp. Here are some of them…

Dark Mode

A bunch of apps today offer dark-mode which is primarily a theme with dark colours and dim lighting. Not only does this help in using the app at night, but it also helps to conserve battery life of your device. We are expecting this feature to hit WhatsApp soon.

3D Touch Action

Exclusive to iPhone users, this feature is speculated to let you to secretly read someone's status without intimidating them. The feature is said to be already available to WhatsApp beta users and should be rolled out end users soon enough.

Fingerprint Unlock

Everyone is concerned with privacy and security in today’s digital age. According to a source, WhatsApp might be working on bringing an extra layer of security by adding fingerprint authorization for the app. This essentially means that users will need to authenticate their identity every time they open the app.

Sticker Integration

WhatsApp added the option of sending stickers last year. This year we are expecting an expansion of this feature where users will finally be able to use third-party apps to share stickers. Until now, you could only make use of the inbuilt stickers, which honestly are only a handful. According to WABetainfo, GBoard will be the first keyboard app that will use the Stickers Integration feature.

Private Replies

A long-awaited feature, private replies was recently introduced for Android users. This feature is expected to finally reach iOS devices. With this feature, users can privately reply to a person in a group chat.

Audio Picker

A new update should introduce a revamped audio picker for WhatsApp. This will allow users to play the audio file before sending it to their contacts. Apart from that, all audio and music files stored on your phone will also be listed in the app for you to send and at a time you will be able to send 30 audio files in one go.