WhatsApp 512-person group chats for people with too many friends are here

Whatsapp Message Hero (Image credit: Luke Filipowicz / iMore)

What you need to know

WhatsApp is rolling out extra-large group chat support.
Up to 512 people can now be in a single group chat.
Those who don't yet see the 512-person group chats should make sure they have the latest version of WhatsApp installed.

WhatsApp is beginning to roll its 512-person group chats out to everyone as of today, progressing from a period that saw the extra-large chats only available to a limited number of people. The previous limit was a maximum of 256 people in any single group chat.

WhatsApp announced that it was going to give people the opportunity to invite up to 511 other people to their group chats two months ago and has slowly been rolling the feature out ever since. 512-person chats were previously only available to some people on the beta version of the app, but that's changing today according to a new report.

Whatsapp 512 Person Group Chats Screenshots (Image credit: WABetaInfo)

As you can see in these screenshots, it is finally possible to create groups with 512 participants, and you can also add them later by opening group info. If you want to verify if the feature is already enabled for your WhatsApp account, it is very easy to check it: just try to create a group and check how many people can be added to it.

Those who are yet to see the expanded group chats should make sure that they have the latest version of WhatsApp from the App Store and give it some time — WhatsApp has a lot of users to get this change rolled out to, after all.

WhatsApp is one of the best iPhone apps for people who need to stay in touch with people who use Android devices and can't take advantage of iMessage. Don't yet have it? You can grab WhatsApp from the App Store for free now.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.