You can now while away your hours sending inane messages and deciphering emoji puzzles in the comfort of the web browser (Google Chrome to be precise). WhatsApp is now officially available on the desktop.
One interesting out-turn is that WhatsApp videos and images can now be embedded on webpages (conditions apply*). While WhatsApp isn’t letting users do that directly, a simple workaround can let you put that viral video on your blog without going through the hassle of downloading it and hosting it somewhere.
The video below is an embedded WhatsApp video:
For how to get WhatsApp on your browser, follow the steps here.
Now click on any image or video thumbnail on WhatsApp Web and when the image/video window opens, right click on the image/video and click ‘Copy image URL’ or ‘Copy video URL’.
Then insert the URL within the code below.
For video:
<video width="640" height="350" controls><source src="INSERT-VIDEO-URL-HERE" type="video/mp4"></video>
For images:
<img src="INSERT-IMAGE-URL-HERE">
(Change the video height and width according to your requirements)
* But there is a possible caveat. WhatsApp’s terms of service states that, “Files that are sent through the WhatsApp Service will reside on our servers after delivery for a short period of time, but are deleted and stripped of any identifiable information within a short period of time in accordance with our general retention policies.”
As I am not sure what WhatsApp’s general retention policies are and would that change now that WhatsApp has added web to its offering, this hack should be treated as an experiment.
it does not seem to work. The video you “embedded” does not play.