WhatsApp's voice notes now continue to play even after you leave a chat

Whatsapp Group Message on iPhone X (Image credit: Luke Filipowicz/iMore)

What you need to know

WhatsApp now will no longer pause voice notes when you leave the thread they are inside.
The new WhatsApp update is now available for download from the App Store.
The voice note feature was first made available to WhatsApp beta testers last month.

WhatsApp will now continue to play voice notes even when you navigate away from the chat thread that they are in. The move comes following a recent WhatsApp update made available via the App Store.

WhatsApp was testing the same feature with beta testers last month and now it appears that the social network is ready to bring it to the masses. With the new WhatsApp update installed via the App Store, people who begin playback of a voice note will be able to move away from that chat thread and continue listening. The note would pause when doing the same thing previously.

WhatsApp's release notes for this new update are suitable sparse, of course.

You can now play voice messages and audio files outside of chats.

If you've yet to install the new update, head to the App Store and you should find it ready and waiting for you. It's worth installing even if you and your friends don't make use of the voice notes feature — you never know what other things WhatsApp has fixed under the hood.

WhatsApp is arguably the best iPhone app for keeping in touch with other people, especially those who use Android devices and don't have access to iMessage.

Don't yet have WhatsApp installed? You can grab it 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.