WhatsApp is getting ready to introduce a new feature: double tap message reactions. This has ben a staple of Instagram DMs for a very long time now, and WhatsApp will borrow it from the other Meta property.
The feature is currently in testing on Android, arriving with the latest beta build. To use it, you need to be on the beta channel of WhatsApp for Android, which you can join on its Play Store listing – that is, if there are any slots available, since a lot of times, there aren’t.
As the name implies, the new feature lets you quickly add a reaction to any message with a double tap. You can react to photos, videos, and GIFs directly from the media viewer screen, saving you milliseconds every time you do it. And double tapping on a message to react also saves you some nanoseconds, the time needed to first long press and then choose your reaction.
Double tapping will react with a heart emoji, just like on Instagram. If you want to react with some other emoji, then you’ll still need to long press what you’re reacting to in order to bring up the reaction tray and pick from there.
Interestingly, there will be no way to disable this double tap to react feature, and that might prove problematic for some users who could accidentally react to old messages this way while scrolling through their chat history.
Now that it’s in the beta, expect this to roll out to everyone in the coming weeks or months.