Real-time location for WhatsApp Android and iOS now available

WhatsApp announced yesterday that it will provide real-time location availability for Android and iOS users, although as stated in its press release, this new feature will be released in the coming weeks. Finally, it only took a few hours to get it up and running for all users with the beta version of the application and we can now enjoy it.

This way, only Windows 10 Mobile users do not yet have the real-time location, nor Nokia Asha and S40 users, who will never get there. A feature that will bring queue, because if we can already control when they read our messages with the blue double check, now we can also control where our contacts are at all times. WhatsApp is undoubtedly becoming a natural controller.

How Real-Time Location Works

How real-time location works, it’s really simple, but we’ll explain it again for the last time now that it’s available to everyone:

• Open a chat with the person or group you want to share with.
• Under “Location” in the attach button, there’s a new option to “Share Live Location.”
• Choose for how long you want to share and tap send.

This way each chat participant will be able to see our location in real time on a map. If more than one person is sharing their Location in real time, you can view all locations on the same map. In addition, if we share the real-time location in a group and enter the group info, we will also see who is sharing their location in real time.

If we go to “Settings > Account > Privacy” we can also see a new option that shows whether or not we are sharing our location in real time, and warns us that this requires location in the background, whose option we can activate in the settings of our phone. This new feature will undoubtedly leave the batteries of our phones somewhat empty.

To stop sharing our location in real time before the selected time runs out, simply enter the chat where you can share it and click on “Stop Sharing”, or go to Settings > Account > Privacy and click on Real Time Location, where we will also have the option to stop sharing.

Comment that WhatsApp’s real-time location sharing uses end-to-end encryption, which is used in chats, ensuring that our location will only be viewed by the people with whom we have shared it.

Finally, and as a curiosity, we would like to mention that WhatsApp missed a future feature in the screenshots it shared from the real-time location for iOS, and that, as you can see below, there are buttons in the groups to make group calls and group video calls, a new feature that will sooner or later reach the application.

We remind you that to download this Beta version from Google Play before you have to convert into beta testers. If you are not yet a beta tester, you will no longer be able to be a beta tester, so if you want to try this new feature you must download the APK of the application by other means, we leave a download link: APK Mirror.