One of the niftiest new tricks to master on the latest versions of WhatsApp is ‘quoting’. Just like doing so in spoken or written conversation, quoting has the same effect on WhatsApp as in real life. It highlights a specific message, in order to make it obvious to all those who read what you’re sending just exactly what it is you’re responding to.
If anyone’s ever sent you a message on WhatsApp with one of your earlier messages attached to it, as if ‘quoted’, then this is them quoting on WhatsApp. It’s a great trick and can make big group chats so much more efficient and comprehensible.
To learn how to quote in WhatsApp, simply follow our step-by-step tutorial. For any additional information on the subject, see our FAQs at the end of this article.
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How to quote in WhatsApp
- Open the WhatsApp app on your device and sign into your account if prompted
- Locate and open a chat in which you have a message to reply to
- Locate a specific message within that chat which you wish to ‘quote’
- Now, tap and hold the message until it’s highlighted, and then press the leftward-pointing arrow up at the top of the screen. You’ll be directed to the textbox and your keyboard will be brought up. You’ll see that the message you’ve chosen to quote appears as a thumbnail above the textbox. This will be included as a ‘quote’ when you press send.
- Tip: An even quicker quoting method is just to swipe the message you want to quote off to the right of the screen
- Tip: An even quicker quoting method is just to swipe the message you want to quote off to the right of the screen
- Write your reply to the quoted message, using all of the same tools as you usually would (i.e. your reply can still include images, audio, video, GIFs, emojis, etc.), and when happy, press the green ‘Send’ arrow
And there you have it! In 5 simple steps, you can master the art of quoting on WhatsApp and clear up any confusion in future chats with the flick of a finger.
For any more info, or if you still have unanswered questions, please see our FAQs below.
What does it mean to ‘quote’ in WhatsApp, and why would I want to?
On WhatsApp, the world’s leading messaging platform, there are seemingly infinite ways to interact with your contacts. You can share GIFs, videos, photos, text, voice notes, stickers, emojis, links, documents, you name it! With so much going on, especially in large group chats, it’s easy for your messages to get lost amongst the clutter.
‘Quoting’ solves this problem with just one surprisingly simple trick. In essence, WhatsApp allows you to ‘quote’ a message sent to you previously to the chat (even if it was you who sent it). When you do so, the quoted message appears above your new message in a little box, making it clear that what you’re now saying is directly related to the quoted message.
And that, in a nutshell, is the point of ‘quoting’ on WhatsApp – to make it clear to all those involved in the chat that what you’re saying is in direct response to a specific earlier message. What this means for you is that you need not worry that the recipient of your message is going to misconstrue it or misinterpret it as pertaining to something it isn’t. Instead, they’ll know exactly to which part of the earlier conversation you are responding to with each new message.
Can I quote anything? Even pictures and GIFs?
Yes, anything! It doesn’t matter if the media in question isn’t something you could, in normal conversation, ‘quote’. Because quoting on WhatsApp just means replying to a specific message, that message can be anything. It can be a GIF, a video, a voice note, a file, a picture, a text message, you name it! So long as it’s been sent to that particular chat, then it can be ‘quoted’ within the same chat.
Can I quote at any time on WhatsApp?
Yes. Sometimes you’ll swipe on a message to quote it, and then begin typing your reply, but other times it’s easy to forget to do this. You may well have written out a full, long reply, and suddenly realize that you haven’t quoted the message yours is in response to. Thankfully, there’s no need to worry.
You can still scroll back up, locate the message you wish to quote, and quote it at any time – even if your own text/dialogue box is full of text, the quote will still be attached to this drafted message.
Can I quote multiple messages at once on WhatsApp?
No, this is the one limitation with quoting which we have a gripe with. It makes sense, doesn’t it? To want to be able to highlight multiple messages and reply to them all at once? Especially in a group setting, where several people might be asking a version of the same question, to which you have the answer.
But no, unfortunately, you can only ever ‘quote’ one message at a time, and until WhatsApp changes that, there’s nothing you can do about it!
