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WhatsApp Upgrades Video Calls With New Features: A Guide
The platform’s latest update adds filters, backgrounds, and a Low Light feature, improving both usability and privacy.
WhatsApp has rolled out a series of exciting updates for its video calling feature, aimed at making conversations more dynamic and enjoyable. The new features allow users to customize their video calls with filters and backgrounds, giving each call a personal touch.
One of the most highly-anticipated additions is the introduction of filters: Users can now apply creative visual effects to their videos, ranging from vibrant color schemes to artistic styles.
now you can add backgrounds and filters on video calls 🤳 set the vibe and show up in new ways, it’s your call pic.twitter.com/LNVWfaKCBy
— WhatsApp (@WhatsApp) October 1, 2024
There are ten filters to choose from, including options like Warm, Cool, Black & White, and Dreamy. Each one sets a different tone, allowing users to pick a filter that suits the mood of their conversation. This feature helps make video calls more engaging and visually appealing.
Another useful upgrade is the ability to change backgrounds during video calls. Users can now replace their actual surroundings with various preset scenes, helping maintain privacy or simply creating a more visually interesting call.
For example, users can appear to be sitting in a cozy living room, a bustling café, or on a serene beach. There’s also a blur option to subtly obscure the background, keeping the focus on you. With ten backgrounds to choose from, this feature ensures flexibility and privacy during calls.
Also Read: How To Find & Cancel Pending Instagram Requests
Additionally, WhatsApp now includes a Low Light mode, which enhances brightness in poorly lit environments, ensuring that your video remains clear regardless of your surroundings. This feature is especially helpful when making calls in dimly lit areas.
To access these new features, simply tap the effects icon in the top right corner of your screen during a video call. Whether you’re on a one-on-one or group call, these updates are easy to use and available in an instant.
News
Nano Banana 2 Arrives In MENA For Google Gemini Users
Google brings its latest image model to Gemini and Search, adding 4K output and tighter text control for regional users.
Google has opened access to Nano Banana 2 across the Middle East and North Africa, pushing its newest image model into everyday tools rather than keeping it inside the exclusive (and expensive) Pro tier.
The rollout spans the Google Gemini desktop and mobile apps, and extends to Google Search through Lens and AI Mode. Developers can also test it in preview via AI Studio and the Gemini API.
Nano Banana 2 runs on Gemini Flash, Google’s fast inference layer. The focus is speed, but also control. Users can export visuals from 512px up to 4K, adjusting aspect ratios for everything from vertical social posts to widescreen displays.
The model maintains character likeness across up to five figures and preserves fidelity for as many as 14 objects within a single workflow. This enables visual continuity across scenes, iterations, or edits — supporting projects like short films, storyboards, and multi-scene narratives. Text rendering has also been improved, delivering legible typography in mockups and greeting cards, with built-in translation and localization directly within images.
Also Read: RØDE Adds Direct iPhone Pairing To Wireless GO And Pro Mics
Under the hood, the system taps Gemini’s broader knowledge base and pulls in real-time information and imagery from web search to render specific subjects more accurately. Lighting and fine detail have been upgraded, without slowing output.
By embedding the model inside Gemini and Search, Google is normalizing advanced image generation for a mass audience. In MENA, where startups and marketing teams are leaning heavily on AI to scale content across languages and borders, that shift lands at a practical moment.
The move also folds creative tooling deeper into search itself, so that image generation is no longer a separate workflow. It now sits right next to the query box.
