WhatsApp: Users can now manage two accounts

Good news for WhatsApp members who have a professional and private account with the service: the messenger now allows users to use two accounts on one device. The developers of the platform announced this on their website.

The advantage according to WhatsApp: with two accounts, the user does not have to log out every time, carry two mobile phones or worry about accidentally sending messages from the wrong account.

How do I set up a second account on a device? For this you need a second telephone number and a SIM card or a phone that supports multi-SIM or eSIM.

That’s how you do it:

A tip: You can set your privacy and notification settings for each account individually.

The WhatsApp developers write that the function can be used “from today”. However, when tested by the editors of t-online, the new version was not yet available on iOS and Android.

The feature should be available to all users in the coming weeks, as WhatsApp normally distributes its innovations gradually to all users worldwide.

WhatsApp is facing radical changes

It was recently announced that new EU regulations are forcing WhatsApp makers to make huge changes. With a new law, the EU wants to oblige Meta’s messaging service to let users communicate directly with contacts from other apps.

Thanks to newly created interfaces, anyone who uses WhatsApp will be able to chat with, for example, Threema, Telegram or Signal users who do not have a WhatsApp account themselves.

The reason for the innovation is the EU’s so-called Digital Markets Act (DMA), which is due to come into force in March 2024. With this, the European Commission wants to limit the power of market-dominant digital companies, the so-called ‘gatekeepers’, and thus guarantee fairer market conditions.