Since WhatsApp’s gained popularity, the app has introduced a lot of features. Some of them are desirable, but we all secretly wish a lot of them didn’t exist.

Take a look at the latest features and how you can use them according to your needs.

1. You can disable your last seen and those dreaded blue ticks.

Did you know you had the option to disable these relationship-destroying, friendship-ruining last seen and blue ticks? Go to ‘Privacy’ and change your ‘Last Seen’ to ‘Nobody’ and uncheck the box which reads ‘Read Receipts’ and your life is saved!

 

2. You can create shortcuts for conversations.

There are always some people you talk to more than others. For this unfortunate few, you can create a shortcut by long pressing on their name and create shortcut option on your phone desktop.

 

3. You can now see when your messages were read.

Have you ever wondered and wanted to know when your messages were read and by whom? Simply long press on the message and choose the ‘Info’ option to find out.

 

4. You can now find out exactly where your friends are.

Have a friend who says they’ve left their home but have just woken up? Now you can find out precisely where they are by asking them to send you their location. And if they try to fool you by sending you a location from maps, you can call them out on it. A location send through WhatsApp never displays the name of the address while it does so, on maps.

 

5. You can set custom notification tones for different chats.

Ever wanted to distinguish notifications from important group chats, your boss or your mother? You can set custom notifications tones for all of them. Just click on the Options button at the top left of the chat and go to View contact/group info and then go to Custom Notifications.

 

6. You can save your mobile data by tweaking a few settings.

Since the arrival of 3G and 4G, you no longer need to be tethered to a Wi-Fi router. You have fast internet on the go. But that doesn’t mean you want to blow your entire data as fast as possible, right? Simply go to Settings and then Data Usage and select the suitable option.

 

7. You can tie the app to your number.

Planning to change your number and are worried about losing old contacts? No worries! You can change your number easily by entering your new number and still be connected to your old contacts.

 

8. You can bookmark messages by starring them.

Say you have to go to a birthday party but your friend’s address is lost somewhere in the 200+ messages in the group chat. Well, instead of going through all the inane bullshit till you find it, you can star important messages by long pressing them and clicking on the star icon. Then when you need to find them, go to settings and click on starred messages.

 

9. You can use WhatsApp on your internet browser.

Are your thumbs too big for that tiny little touch keyboard on the screen? Well, worry no more you thick fingered freak because there is a solution and it’s called WhatsApp Web. Open the browser to the WhatsApp Web page and a QR code will appear. Go to Settings on your WhatsApp, select the option for WhatsApp Web and scan the code and start chatting.

 

10. You can reply to messages without even having to open the chat.

We all have suffered from the fear of people reading our private conversations. To avoid this, you can enable the pop-up option. Instead of having to go to your chat to respond, you can type your reply into the pop-up and press send. Go to Settings, then click on Notifications and you’ll see the pop-up options. Choose one from four different privacy settings.

 

11. You can use font styles like bold, italics and strikethrough too.

One of WhatsApp’s most recent features has been the ability to customize the font of the texts you send. Use strike-through. Make them italic. Make them bold.
Let’s take the word hello as an example. To make it bold, type *hello*. To Make it italic, type _hello_. To use strike-through, type ~hello~.

 

This article originally appeared here.