London - ALsharqiya November 23: WhatsApp announced the launch of the "Text Messages Voice Transcription" feature, stressing that this feature will be useful while on the go or in noisy places, where it is difficult to hear voice messages, according to the "Tech Crunch" website. A similar feature was announced last year for Apple's Messages app, as it came with the "iOS 17" update. Apple's Messages app is known to be one of the most prominent competitors to WhatsApp. The new feature from WhatsApp allows converting voice messages in a conversation into texts, which helps users continue their conversations in circumstances where it is difficult to listen to audio recordings. WhatsApp explained that the transcribed texts cannot be read by any third party, which ensures the preservation of users' privacy.
How to activate the feature:
The "Voice Messages Texts" option can be found in WhatsApp settings under the "Chats" section. It can be easily enabled or disabled, with an option to select the language in which the user wants to transcribe the texts. To transcribe a voice message, long-press on the message, then click on the "Write Text" option. It is worth noting that the feature will not automatically convert all messages to text, according to TechCrunch.
Launching details and language support:
WhatsApp announced that it will gradually roll out the voice message text feature globally over the coming weeks, with support for some languages depending on the operating system:
iPhone devices:
If the operating system is "iOS 16", the supported languages will be: English, Arabic, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Turkish, and Chinese.
If the operating system is "iOS 17" or higher, other languages will be added, including: Danish, Finnish, Malay, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Hebrew, and Thai.
Android devices:
Supports transcribed texts in the languages: English, Portuguese, Spanish, and Russian only.
