WhatsApp Direct Group Call Shortcut Button Started Rolling out to Android Users

Last year WhatsApp announced the integration of a shortcut button to make the group call in their application. The feature was testing in the beta version for the past few months. Now it is started rolling out to the public users.

The latest released version of the WhatsApp supports the group call with a single button. The feature is now available to the android users who updated the application to version 2.19.17 or above. After update, you will see a call icon within all your WhatsApp groups.

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Earlier, the group call with maximum 4 participants was available in WhatsApp, however in order to do that, one needs to call the first person from their chat list individually, then from within the call, we have to add other 2 participants. Even Though it supports group call feature, but the calls are made separately and not from the groups.

Now, with the new call button inside the group chat, users can make calls directly from the group to the participants of that particular group. But the maximum number of participants is still 4 and you can choose 3 person from the group before making the call.

How the new feature works ?

If you updated your WhatsApp to the latest version, you can see a call button over the top of the window as like in the screenshot below.

WhatsApp Group Call Button 1

Click on that call button, Now, you will see a window contains the list of all the members on that group.

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Select 3 members from that list, the selected members will be highlighted and video and voice call button will be visible to the side.

WhatsApp Group Call Button 2

Once selected the members, you can click on the Voice or Video call button, depends on your choice to start the call.

WhatsApp Group Call Button 3

Benefits of the Group Call shortcut button

With the integration of the call button / icon within the group, it is easier to call your friends and family. Earlier, we need to add participants to an ongoing call. In that case, we may need to go through all the WhatsApp contact to find the person. Alternatively we use the search feature to find the person. Now we can skip that process.

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Secondly, in the earlier method, we don’t have the option to select the participants before call. We used to add new participant in an ongoing call. This makes some issue, we may sometime add wrong person accidentally. There is no confirmation for the selection. With a single click, the participant will be added to the call. This issue also can be solved to some extend with this new feature.

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