WhatsApp has become one of the most popular messaging apps, with over 2 billion users worldwide. One of the key features that makes WhatsApp so useful is the ability to mute contacts – this allows you to control which conversations you receive notifications from.
What does muting a contact on WhatsApp do?
When you mute a contact on WhatsApp, you stop receiving notifications for any new messages sent by that person. Their messages will still come through to you, but you won’t get sound or vibration alerts for them.
Muting is useful for contacts you don’t necessarily want to block completely, but that you don’t need to be notified about constantly. For example, you could mute:
- Group conversations that are very active
- Friends or family members who share a lot of content
- Work colleagues when you are on vacation
With a muted contact, you are still able to find and read their messages in the relevant chat when you open the WhatsApp app. Muting is not the same as blocking or deleting a contact, which prevents you receiving any messages from them at all.
How to mute an individual contact
Muting an individual contact is easy to do in just a few steps:
- Open the WhatsApp app and go to your Chats tab
- Select the contact you want to mute
- Tap the name of the contact at the top of the chat window
- Select Mute from the menu that pops up
- Choose to mute for 8 hours, 1 week or Always (until you unmute)
And that’s it! The contact’s chat will now show a mute icon next to their name, and you will stop receiving notifications.
How to mute a group conversation
You can also mute busy and active group chats on WhatsApp using these steps:
- Open WhatsApp and go to the Chats tab
- Tap on the group conversation you want to mute
- Tap on the group subject at the top of the screen
- Select Mute from the menu
- Choose to mute for 8 hours, 1 week or Always (until you unmute)
The group chat will now show a mute icon next to the name, indicating that notifications are silenced.
Customizing mute settings
You have a few options for customizing the muting experience on WhatsApp:
- Mute duration – Choose a duration of 8 hours, 1 week or always muted when you first mute a chat.
- Custom notifications – You can opt to still receive notifications for certain types of messages, like mentions and replies, while muting the chat.
- Mute archived chats – Automatically mute conversations when you archive them, and unmute when unarchived.
Play around with these settings to create the muting behavior that works best for your needs.
Unmuting a contact or group
When you’re ready to start receiving notifications again from a muted chat, unmuting is easy:
- Open the muted WhatsApp chat
- Tap on the contact/group name at the top
- Select Unmute from the menu
Notifications will be immediately turned back on for that conversation.
Things to know about muted chats
Here are some key points to understand about how muting works in WhatsApp:
- Muting is device specific – you need to mute chats on each device you use WhatsApp
- The other person is not notified when you mute or unmute them
- Muted statuses will not show in your feed
- You can still find and open muted chats like normal
- Messages sent during muted period will show as unread
Who can see your muted chats?
Muting conversations is a client-side function – this means the mute status is only visible to you, the user. Other participants in the chat won’t know if you have muted it or not.
Individual chats
When you mute an individual contact, that person has no indication that you have muted them. Your messages to them will still send as normal.
Group chats
For group conversations, muting also only applies to you as the user. Other group participants can still mention you and send you messages that will go through.
Muting vs blocking vs archiving
There are a few different ways to reduce notifications and tidy up your WhatsApp chats. Here’s how muting compares to other options:
| Action | Effect |
|---|---|
| Muting | You stop receiving notifications for new messages, but can still read messages and send messages to the chat. |
| Blocking | You stop receiving any messages or status updates from the contact. The block is visible to the other user. |
| Archiving | Chat is removed from your main Chats tab but remains accessible if you search for it. Can mute archived chats. |
Conclusion
Muting is a handy built-in feature on WhatsApp that gives you control over which conversations to receive notifications from. By muting busy groups or overly-active contacts, you can focus on the most important chats.
Muting is temporary and reversible, so you can enable notifications again in future. And the mute status is invisible to other users, so you don’t have to worry about offending anyone!
Understanding how to mute and unmute on WhatsApp will help you enjoy the app even more. Reducing noisy distractions creates space for meaningful connections with your closest contacts.