Millions of people use WhatsApp on a daily basis. From personal chats to group messaging, WhatsApp has proven itself as a top app for staying in touch. However, group messages and chats can become somewhat overwhelming, especially if you’ve missed a few messages, the numbers can quickly mount up. Trying to catch up on what you’ve missed can be an almost insurmountable task leading to users either ignoring the messages completely, or skimming and missing crucial points. The introduction of WhatsApp’s AI-powered summary will likely be a blessing to many. But what exactly does it offer and will this update be as useful as it sounds?
What do AI Chat Summaries Do?
This new feature in the upcoming WhatsApp update is geared toward helping those with lots of group chat traffic. The summaries will create a short blurb using the information from unread messages. This will save users having to scroll and scan through hundreds of messages to see what was missed.
It will also avoid annoying questions from those who missed out on something vital. Essentially, it means that there’s an instant catch-up button within the app. It will be part of Meta’s wider push toward AI integration and spans WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger.
The way these summaries will work is not clear just yet, as WhatsApp has yet to release the official documents for this update. However, it looks like this feature uses on-device AI or Meta’s own language models to parse context, detect themes within a conversation, and condense long threads into short summaries. It might be hard at first given that WhatsApp is known for having a somewhat informal style, the ability to use GIFs and memes, as well as erratic timestamps.
Comparisons to other platforms
WhatsApp is far from being the only service to offer this type of summary. Already, platforms like Slack, Gmail and ChatGPT offer just that. So, will WhatsApp work as well? WhatsApp has a lot of unique challenges in this area. For example, unlike the more straightforward structure of other platforms, WhatsApp has no thread structure, no subject lines and lacks any type of formatting hierarchy. With this in mind, it’s going to be an ambitious use of AI summarization in real-time messaging.
Luckily, it has real-world applications, not just being a fun update to nerd out over. This has the ability to help you get recaps on a wide range of things. For example, if you’re in a family group chat, you’ll be able to find out exactly what the plans are for dinner, holidays and so on. Anyone working across different time zones and using WhatsApp for communication is likely to find they regularly awake to many messages. Remote work groups with this style of operation, will be able to catch up super quickly with no need to scroll for hours. It’ll also help those who are in various communities. Whether you’re in an online book club, or a sports fan, WhatsApp’s AI summaries are going to be a game-changer. If you’re following live updates or Premier Bet Zimbabwe tips in a group chat, these summaries are all you need to use to catch up on all the key information in seconds — match results, bets placed, and even friendly banter, all condensed for you into a quick read.
Staying Private
Whenever a new update rolls out, privacy concerns are paramount. Now, WhatsApp prides itself on never checking in on conversations nor recording anything. But will it be different using AI? For anyone planning to use this feature, it’s important to know whether the content is processed on-device or sent to Meta’s servers. Another pressing concern is whether or not summaries will respect encrypted chats and disappearing messages in their operations. And will users have control over the summaries and storage of this information. Unfortunately, some of these questions are yet to be addressed, which could impact how widely available this is going to be operating. Europe and the UK are very privacy-conscious, so it may be slower to roll out here.
With no official launch date, there’s still time for these questions to be addressed. And it’s likely to be staggered anyway, hitting Android devices first before going to iOS and finally global testing.