WhatsApp would like to make it easier to ignore chats that are months old or groups that are too "noisy." Here's how the new archived mode works
It may soon be possible to ignore new messages received on WhatsApp's archived chats. The novelty has already been in testing for a while, the first time we heard about it was in October 2018, and it's present in the 2.19.101 beta of the WhatsApp app.
At the moment, with the current version of the instant messaging service's app, you can already archive a chat and hide it from the list. But as soon as you receive a new message in the archived chat, it resurfaces. The new feature, on the other hand, allows you to no longer see that chat even if new messages arrive. This is also why this feature is called "Vacation Mode" in the jargon: if you don't want to be disturbed by messages, you archive the chat and you don't see them anymore. However, the ignored messages will still be visible if we open the chat, so nothing will be lost and, when we come back from vacation, we can read without problems all that we have (voluntarily) missed.
How WhatsApp's archived chats change
Also in the latest beta of the app, archived chats are placed in a special sub-menu. This way, to reactivate them, you don't need to go searching through all the others and you can easily locate them even if you archived them months ago. WhatsApp betas are used to test features that are not always released in the official version. Or they are implemented, but in a different way: the previous version of Vacation Mode seen in the October beta, for example, acted on archived and muted chats, while this one acts on all archived ones.
In other previous betas, then, features such as a label for "Frequently Forwarded" messages, the ability to disable such messages in group chats (to avoid spam and chain letters), Google reverse image search directly integrated into the app, the ability to sort chats by status updates, and the long-awaited Dark Mode for the dark theme appeared. That's why we can't say, today, when Vacation Mode will really arrive on the official WhatsApp app. We can say, however, that the technicians are still working on it and that this handy feature expected by a lot of users has not been put aside for the time being.