My work requires me to use both Android and iOS devices and I love both the operating systems equally. And that’s why I hate it when developers treat Android like a lesser operating system. WhatsApp has been doing it for a while now even though a majority of its users use Android smartphones. Gripes aside, I am happy that the company is at least bringing the new features to their Android app rather than completely abandoning it like some developers do. All that is to say that finally, WhatsApp has brought the new fingerprint lock feature to Android. In this article, I am going to show you how you can enable fingerprint lock on WhatsApp on Android devices.
Enable Fingerprint Lock on WhatsApp on Android
You can enable the fingerprint lock on WhatsApp by visiting the privacy settings of the app. I have tested this feature on multiple Android devices and it works flawlessly. Here is the step-by-step guide you can follow to secure your chats on WhatsApp.
1. Tap on the three-dot menu on the top right of WhatsApp and then tap on Settings.
2. Here, tap on Accounts and then on Privacy.
3. Scroll down to find the “Fingerprint lock” option and tap on it. Now, tap on the toggle to turn it on.
4. In the next step, WhatsApp will ask you to confirm your fingerprint so touch on the fingerprint sensor of your device to confirm it. Once confirmed, you will see that there is an option to set the “Automatically Lock” time. You can choose between immediately, 1 minute, and 30 minutes.
Finally, there’s a toggle to enable/disable message previews. It is turned on by default which means you will be able to see messages in notifications. If you want to turn off message preview, turn off this toggle.
5. Once you have enabled the fingerprint lock, this is how your WhatsApp will open if anyone wants to access it without your permission.
While we have been able to lock WhatsApp and any other app for that matter using various third-party apps on Android, it’s great to have a native option as it’s more secure and streamlined.
SEE ALSO: How to Enable RCS Messaging on Your Android Phone
Protect WhatsApp Chats with Bio-metric Lock
That was a simple tutorial to show you how you can lock WhatsApp chats using the new fingerprint lock feature. While I welcome this feature on Android, I hope that developers will release the same features on both iOS and Android at the same time. I hate to wait for a feature on Android which I have been using on my iPhone for months. That’s all from my side. Do let us know how you feel about this new WhatsApp feature by writing in the comments section below.
