WhatsApp has redesigned its storage management tool, making it easier for users to find and delete files that are taking up too much space on their phone. The new tool will be “rolling out to users worldwide this week,” says the Facebook-owned company, and will be available in the app by heading to Settings > Storage and data > Manage storage.
The current WhatsApp “Storage Usage” tool simply sorts all available chats by the amount of space they take up, listing the number of messages, photos, GIFs, and videos in each chat, and letting the user delete each category with a few taps. This is handy, but doesn’t give users a way to browse the content they’re removing. That’s important if you need to clear out, say, a family group chat, and want to avoid deleting any important photos.
The new tool, by comparison, offers thumbnails of content to be deleted, and groups this data in categories including “Forwarded many times” and “Larger than 5 MB.” That should make it easier for users to identify content that they don’t need or want any more, and that can simply be deleted. You can see a preview of the new tool in action below:
