Group chats on WhatsApp are great for getting your friends all in one place, but the bigger the group, the more notifications you'll probably get. Needless to say, it can get annoying real quick. You can mute notifications for all your conversations, but that's not practical if some are important. However, there is an option to mute group chats themselves and even leave them when needed.
FaceTime has been around since iOS 4, and year after year, things stayed pretty much the same aside from a few small changes. In iOS 6, calls over cellular networks were finally possible, and audio-only calls were officially supported starting in iOS 7. But the one feature most everyone has wanted since FaceTime was a thing — group video calls — didn't show up until iOS 12.1 for iPhone.
In case you missed it, you don't have to chat one-on-one anymore in Snapchat. The company added group chats back in 2016, and they are increasingly gaining new features such as video and audio chats, so communicating Snapchat-style with all your friends at once is better than it's ever been.
While some of our group chats should probably remain private and closed off, others will only get better with more people. Whether you're organizing an event and need a headcount or you want to share a funny YouTube video with a large crowd, you can add all the friends you wish to on Facebook Messenger by sending them a unique link.
There's a fine line between order and chaos in group chats. With all the cross-talk, threads can easily devolve into a random mess that has nothing to do with the original discussion topic. WhatsApp group chats certainly aren't immune to this problem, but they've recently taken a step in the right direction.
Waking up to hundreds of text messages in the morning usually points to one thing—group messages. Whether it's your fantasy football league, your work buddies, or just a bunch of bored friends, group messages can leave your iPhone vibrating off the hook.
On April 3, 2018, Snapchat announced that the phone and video calling feature that's long been a feature of one-on-one calls would be coming to group chats. Well, late on Monday, April 17, the feature was finally pushed out to everyone for Snapchat groups on Android and iPhone.
Are your Safari tabs a tangled mess? I know mine are. Whenever I try to find an open website on my iPhone, I face dozens, sometimes hundreds of tabs. Yes, there's Search, but it's not perfect if you don't remember the right keyword to narrow the results. That's where custom tab groups come in.
You can view and hide iCloud contact groups on your iPhone, but Apple won't let you create or delete groups or add or delete contacts from any groups unless you're on a tablet or computer. Why Apple refuses to add a group management tool to Contacts on iOS is anybody's guess, but there is a workaround you can use instead.
Apple has introduced several new features to its native Messages app with iOS 14. When it comes to group chats, you can now pin those conversations, use inline replies, and receive notifications only when you're tagged. And if that wasn't good enough, you or anyone else in the group can assign a photo for the entire group.
Group messages are great when you want to talk to multiple people at the same time. However, things can get disorderly real fast in the Messages app, especially if the same person is in multiple group conversations. That's where custom group names come in, which helps you make sense of all those disorganized threads with multiple names/numbers attached.
There's not much to the Messages app for iPhone when it comes to finding the right conversations. It did get some enhanced search capabilities in iOS 13, but beyond that, there's no good way to find the threads you need aside from just scrolling through the main page, which lists newer ones first. However, there is a tweak that gives you the power to group like-minded chats together.
Group chats in Facebook Messenger can devolve into outright noise pollution as people chit chat randomly and bombard you with distracting notifications. Unfortunately, leaving the group outright alerts everyone inside, so if you want to get out of the thread unnoticed, what exactly can you do?
Group chats can get out of control. One minute you're in the middle of a thoughtful debate, the next minute everybody is sending gratuitous stickers and emojis like nobody's business. If you're at work or school, this can obviously get a little frustrating as your notifications fill up, even with your iPhone on silent. Luckily, there's a simple option — leave the group.
Apple's Reminders app has never been particularly sexy or appealing, but that changes in iOS 13. Although the productivity tool has always been useful for quick to-dos, it now has an overhauled user interface with several new features, including grouping lists together for improved organization.
Group chats in WhatsApp are great for communicating with multiple people at once, but that can be a blessing and a curse — any message you send will be seen by everyone, and that's not always ideal. Thankfully, there's a new feature that lets you respond to group messages privately.
Facebook just added another feature to Messenger as part of its quest to have their service become an all-encompassing communications app. This feature lets you make free group calls using Messenger's VoIP service, and you can chat with up to 50 people at once.
Group chats are fun, effective ways of staying in touch with the many people in our lives. Whether it's the local friend chat or the group from work, we rely on these groups to keep connected. Running one of these group chats, however, can be a monster task. If you're feeling overwhelmed with administrative responsibilities, why not pass on that burden to another member of the Telegram group?
The bigger the group chat, the harder it is to follow. Messages start flying one after the other, and before you know it, you're hopelessly lost in the conversation. With most chat apps, there's nothing you can do, other than telling your friends to slow down a bit. But on Telegram, you can make them slow down.
Music has always been able to connect us. Spotify is now offering an innovative new way to do just that. The company announced today that they have launched a new feature in collaboration with the Messenger app that allows you to share and make playlists with friends.
Ah, the dreaded "green bubble" group chat. All it takes is one non-iPhone contact to turn an entire thread from iMessage paradise to SMS slog. Normally, it isn't that bad since the group chat still functions. However, sometimes, you end up getting messages individually instead of in a single group thread. Before you go blaming your Android friends, know that the issue is probably on your end.
With group chats, arguments tend to devolve from a dispute between two people to a giant debate amongst all members. But before things get out of control, Telegram has a feature that can help.
Whatever it is you're into, Facebook Groups are a great way to connect with others that share your interests. And beyond matching you up with like-minded people, Groups also give you access to deals on items, help you organize play dates with families in the same area, and so much more.
Thanks to its encrypted messaging, WhatsApp can be a platform for secure communication with friends and family. One drawback, however, is that the app would let anyone add you to a group chat, regardless of if you approved it or not. This lack of control over your own account is over, as WhatsApp now lets you decide who can add you to a group chat.
Directing a message at a specific person in a group conversation, or to a select few people in the group, can be difficult if you're in a particularly active or hectic chat. Notifications and badges on your iPhone can help you keep track of important messages, but it's still easy to miss one meant for you and not the entire group — which is why you can now mention contacts, or get tagged, in Messages on iOS 14.
While WhatsApp remains one of the world's most popular messaging apps, you could only call or video chat with one friend at a time. To group audio or video chat, you'd have to use a different app, but that's no longer the case. Announced on July 30, 2018, WhatsApp now lets you group audio or video call with up to three more users on Android and iOS.
What type of person are you in group settings? Are you the social butterfly, eager to get to know everyone and interested in the people more than the setting? Or are you a wallflower, afraid to catch anyone's eye out of fear?
Facebook Messenger is a messaging app first, but of its more than 1.3 billion monthly users, 32 percent use its video chat feature at least once every month. While it may seem pretty straightforward to video call with family and friends on Messenger, there are many tips and tricks that can help enhance your experience.
One of iOS 12's biggest attractions is Group FaceTime, which would allow up to 32 people to video chat together at the same time. It's quite the pitch, and many iOS users are excited to see in action. Unfortunately, Apple has confirmed that Group FaceTime won't be included with iOS 12 when it launches, leaving everyone to chat one-on-one just a little bit longer.
Following closely behind the developer beta, Apple released the first public beta for iOS 12.1 to testers Thursday, Sept. 20. The update comes only two days after developers received their first look at 12.1. Both the developer and public betas surprisingly mark the return of Group FaceTime, allowing beta testers to chat with up to 31 other friends.
Whenever a new version of a phone comes out, there's always that one cool feature you wish you had on yours. For me, that's Group Play.
Apple just released the third iOS 12.2 developer beta Tuesday, Feb. 19, fifteen days after the release of iOS 12.2 developer beta 2. Beta 3 fixes an issue with the lock screen, and reintroduces Group FaceTime to beta testers. Overall, iOS 12.2 hosts a wealth of new features as well as bug and security patches.
Apple found itself in serious trouble last week when a teenager discovered a critical FaceTime bug that threatened the security of nearly every iPhone user. The bug enabled a user using Group FaceTime to access either the microphone or the camera of a recipient before they answered the call. According to Apple, the issues have been fixed in an iOS 12.1.4 update released Thursday, Feb. 7.
Apple released the first beta for iOS 12.1 on Tuesday, Sept. 18. The update comes just one day after the official release of iOS 12. For developers, it's the first beta release since the "gold master" version on Sept. 12.
Snapchat has added yet another social feature to its mobile app, and this one makes it possible to use augmented reality with a group of friends over video.
Ah, the age-old problem of sharing pictures with friends and family. Ten years ago, the best method available to us was passing around duplicate photos printed out at the local drug store. As easy as smartphones have made this act, you'd think we'd be satisfied by now.
By now, Samsung's Multi-Window Mode is a pretty well-known feature. With other manufacturers now recreating this functionality in their own flagships, like LG, it's safe to say the feature has been a hit with consumers.
I'm a pretty nice person, so when someone asks me to take a group picture of their friends or family, I can't easily say "no," even if I have somewhere else to be. Even worse—sometimes I'm the one asking, fully knowing just how annoying it can be. Maybe you've been told "no" before, and have had to settle for being left out of the picture, which kind of sucks.
When using Group FaceTime with more than a handful of people, all of those participants in one chat can be difficult to follow. That's why Apple automatically enlarges the tiles for people who are currently speaking, bringing them into the forefront. However, all of that zooming in and out can get pretty distracting, and now there's a way to disable it whenever you need to.
If you have any group chats going, you're surely familiar with this scenario: One person sends a picture, then, within 30 seconds or so, all other participants chime in with one-word responses like "Cute," or "Awesome." It's a social nicety, so you have to expect this behavior, but that doesn't make it any less annoying when your phone randomly beeps and vibrates ten times in a row because of it.
