WhatsApp introduces emoji reactions, larger files, and huge groups

WhatsApp is now introducing the ability to respond to a message with emojis and share files up to 2GB in size, a huge leap from the previous 100MB limit. Meta, the company behind WhatsApp, said last month that these features were coming “soon,” and it seems like today is the day. The company also announced on Thursday that it would double the maximum size of group chats.

When the reactions were first announced, Meta said you could only use a few to get started, but that support for “all emojis and skin tones” would be added in the future.

Reactions are a useful feature, which is why other apps like Slack and Telegram have had them for a while — if you want to show that a message made you laugh without clogging up the group chat, now you have a way to do it . That’s about to become especially important as WhatsApp is also expanding the default maximum group chat size, increasing the cap from 256 to 512 (although there have reportedly been hack-y workarounds to exceed the previous limit).

WhatsApp’s blog post notes that larger groups are being rolled out “slowly” while emoji reactions and increased file size limits become available in the current version of the app. said meta spokesman Vispi Bhopti The edge that the company expects the reactions to roll out to everyone in “about a week”, but added that some users already have the feature.

Update May 5th 7:13pm ET: Added information about how long it would take for emoji reactions to be rolled out.