WhatsApp will let you set up group chats without having to come up with a name

As someone in a dozen WhatsApp groups called ‘Drinks?’ I approve this development.

WhatsApp will soon let users create new group chats without having to name them, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced. Unnamed groups will instead be given an auto-generated name based on their participants. In a screenshot shared by Zuckerberg, we can see one such group titled “Rocco & Li-Chen.”

Although it’s a minor feature, not having to name each and every group chat should be helpful for those times when you’re sending group messages for one-off events. I’m personally in a dozen or so WhatsApp groups that are just titled “Drinks?” which were set up for a one-off event and were never intended to be an ongoing group chat. Being able to see a list of participants in the chat list rather than a nondescript group chat title feels like an improvement to me.

According to TechCrunch, unnamed groups will be limited to six participants, rather than the thousand-plus that can normally join a WhatsApp group. The app will use the names you’ve saved individual contacts as to generate a group name, which means that group names will appear differently for their different participants (so if you have a contact saved as “Mom,” then you’ll see “Mom” in the group chat name).

The new auto group naming feature is rolling out globally to WhatsApp users over the coming days on iOS, Android, web, and macOS. It joins a host of new WhatsApp features officially announced in recent months, including support for sending less compressed images, an instant video message feature, and the ability to screen share.