The ‘WhatsApp calls’ folder in the working WhatsApp directly has been around since a few versions of the popular IM client, but the real functionality was yet to surface… until today. A few users in India, such as Reddit’s pradnesh07, have started receiving the update. The criteria for selection of users isn’t clear as yet, which has left many dumbfounded, especially those that are extensive users of the popular app.
“Its like an invite thing, where a person with the call feature needs to “call” another person who wants to start using the feature. You need to get the apk from the website and not from the PlayStore,” adds the Redditor. “The guy who sent me the invite confirmed that it works on other phones on other ROMs and other OS and in other countries. I am not sure how the invite thing works as of yet. I made a quick video of how the call works and looks so that you guys can share. And there is no use asking me for invites right now, I don’t know how this invite thing works exactly,” is what the Redditor has to add about the peculiar ‘invite’ feature, which has yet to be decoded.
If you’re a root user, though, there’s a workaround to getting to the calling screen, given that you are on the latest build (which isn’t available on the Play Store yet, but can be downloaded off of WhatsApp.com). If that is the case, you need to fire up any terminal emulator, and go into root mode by sending the ‘su’ command. Next, you have to type ‘am start com.whatsapp/com.whatsapp.HomeActivity’ and hit enter, without the quotes of course. I tested it on my Android 4.4 KitKat Elephone P6000, and as you can see from the picture above, it does work, even though I wasn’t able to call anyone.
The Reddit user we talked about earlier put together a video as well, which we’ve embedded right below. In the video, the user is seen calling a peer of his via the WhatsApp call feature. We aren’t yet certain how long it will take for the feature to land on the public platform, but it shouldn’t be too long.
