On WhatsApp, we can create groups for friends and channels for those who want to follow us constantly, but what if we wanted to create a new community based on a common hobby, interest, or pastime? Until now we could only create groups WhatsApp has broadened its socializing possibilities by also providing a Community function mostly designed for those who want to share ideas in common and talk only about what we like, even with strangers.We will show you in the following guide how to create and manage communities on WhatsApp and what we can do if the feature is not yet available on our phone (since the function is not unlocked for everyone at launch).READ ALSO -> WhatsApp: 40 tricks and secrets of the chat on Android and iPhone
1) What is a WhatsApp community
WhatsApp communities allow users to organize and bring together groups with common interests such as football, information technology, cooking, video games, technology in general, study paths, and much more.
Community administrators can send attendees updates via message boards and community participants can stay connected by reaching out within the community or speaking privately with one of the community members.
We are actually talking about one enhanced version of the groups already present on WhatsApp, designed to increase sociability between groups of people (in fact we can add the groups already present on our profile). The function, for now, is not present on all devices and in every part of the world, but in a short time, it will be available to everyone.
2) How to create a community on WhatsApp
Per create a community of WhatsApp from an android phone we open the messaging app, press the button at the top left Community press Create a community and insert the name, description, and profile picture of the community.
The community must be linked to a group, already existing or created new.
If we wanted to create a WhatsApp community on iPhone all we have to do is open the WhatsApp app, press the button Community down, press Create a community, and enter the name, description, and profile picture of the community in this case as well.
Also, WhatsApp Web and the app WhatsApp per PC e Mac allow you to create a new community, without going through the phone app. In this case, we can open our new community by opening the app or website, logging in by scanning the QR code, clicking on the button Scheda community, and following the same steps seen by mobile devices.
3) Management of a community on WhatsApp
The first thing to know when creating a community are the limits imposed by WhatsApp itself which we can find below:
- we can create a WhatsApp community with up to 50 groups in addition to the wall;
- we can add up to 5000 participants to a community wall.
Pressing on the Community in Whatsapp, it is possible to modify the information and manage the participants. Also, you can press on the key Invite attendees to be able not only to invite friends but also to create a link or a QR code to spread to get anyone who wants to sign up.
If we are administrators of our community we can, therefore “join” up to 50 groups and add up to 5000 people for access to the public bulletin board (a sort of showcase of ideas and content present in the community).
The community bulletin board allows admins to post announcements and messages relevant to all those who participate in the community: in fact, only administrators can leave messages on the bulletin board, so as to avoid that there may be too much disorder.
Participants with permissive privacy (possibility to be added to any group) are automatically added to the board when they join a community. Each community participant can view how many participants are part of it but also turn off the wall notifications.
If we’ve been invited to a community but we’re getting too many notifications from the wall we can leave the bulletin board while continuing to be part of the community so as to avoid leaving the lap in which we have chosen to participate.
Administrators are the only ones who can see all community participant select new administrators (but the creator can always intervene to resolve thorny issues and remove the other administrators).
The community management menu is present in the top right menu (on Android) after opening a community; if instead we wanted to manage the community from the iPhone, just open the menu Community and press on Manage groups.
4) How to unlock the community function on WhatsApp
Many users still don’t have the community feature unlocked on their phones. Since the function is not yet available in all countries and on all devices, the advice we can give you is to wait and constantly update the WhatsApp app, so that sooner or later you can receive this new function.
If we believe that the app is out of date, we can update it manually by opening the Google Play Store (on Android), pressing the profile icon at the top right, pressing Manage apps and device Updates available, and pressing Check for updates.
On the iPhone we can force the WhatsApp update by opening the App Store, pressing on the profile picture, and pressing on Refresh everything under the section Updates pending.
Always on Android devices, we can download the APKs in WhatsApp Beta, thus forcing the appearance of the new feature. To install APKs we can read our guide on how to install android apps from apk files.
Conclusions
WhatsApp communities are a response to the Supergroups seen on Telegram but in a much more social sauce. In fact, we can unite several existing groups to create a huge community of friends or people with the same interests, administer the bulletin board of this community, and connect people who have not met until now.
We have already created one How2do.org community (even if it is empty for the moment and we will see if and how to use it) to which you can still subscribe starting from this address https://chat.whatsapp.com/BlI90qFAhAx4qGpo4iF9uP or via this QR code.
To learn more we can read our Telegram vs WhatsApp comparison guide come on how to hide WhatsApp messages, chats, and contacts.