WhatsApp App Review

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What Is WhatsApp?

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WhatsApp is a free messaging app by Meta (the parent company of Facebook and Instagram). ‍

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‍It allows users to send text messages, voice messages, photos, videos, documents, and locations to individuals or groups. WhatsApp can also be used for voice and video calls, including group calls.

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The app is extremely popular worldwide and is often used as a replacement for traditional texting because it works over Wi-Fi and mobile data. While WhatsApp markets itself as simple and private, its features can raise important safety considerations for families.

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WhatsApp’s official age requirement is 13, but there is no reliable age-verification process, making it easy for younger kids to sign up.

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How Does WhatsApp Work?

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To create a WhatsApp account, users must provide a phone number. Once registered, WhatsApp automatically syncs with the phone’s contact list to show which contacts are already using the app.

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Key features include:

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• One-on-one messaging
• Group chats (up to hundreds of participants)
• Voice and video calls
• Disappearing messages (similar to Snapchat)
• Status updates (similar to Stories on other platforms)
• Media sharing, including photos, videos, and voice notes

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WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption, meaning messages can only be read by the sender and recipient. While this protects privacy, it also means parents and law enforcement have limited visibility into harmful and inappropriate conversations. 

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This alone makes WhatsApp a high-risk environment for digital communication. 

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What Do Parents Need to Know about WhatsApp?

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WhatsApp includes several features that can pose risks for kids and teens. The way we as parents and adults experience this app, can be extremely different than how our kids might experience it. With scams and predators often perferring to use this app for secret communications due to the apps "end-to-end" encryption. WhatsApp has a wide range of risks that parents should consider:

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1. WhatsApp Group Chats Are Risky

Group chats are a great concern on WhatsApp. 

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Kids can be added to large groups without parental approval, exposing them to inappropriate language or content, cyberbullying, or messages from people they don’t know well. Either from friends of friends or from complete strangers.

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2. WhatsApp Has Disappearing Messages

Like Snapchat, WhatsApp allows messages to disappear automatically after a set time. 

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Whenever content disappears, there is often a higher risk of secret conversations, less accountability for harmful behavior, difficulty for parents in checking their kids’ activity, and it’s nearly impossible for law enforcement to address serious harms that happen on WhatsApp. 

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Predators often seek to move conversations from other platforms onto Snapchat or WhatsApp because of this. Because of this, WhatsApp may see more predatory activity than other messaging apps.

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However, you can prevent message from disappearing! We explain how in the next section.

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3. WhatsApp Allows Easy Contact with Strangers

If a child’s phone number is shared or guessed, strangers can message them directly. Blocking and reporting tools exist, but they rely on the child recognizing and responding to a problem. 

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This allows for strangers to add people into group chats easily.

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4. WhatsApp Contains Scams and Inappropriate Content

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WhatsApp has been used for scams, explicit content sharing, and impersonation attempts. Kids may not recognize warning signs as easily as adults.

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5. WhatsApp Doesn’t Have Parental Controls

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As with most Meta apps, the parental controls are rather limited. 

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WhatsApp does not offer built-in parental controls or a dedicated parent dashboard. With limited controls available, it’s up to us dive into the settings. 

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You can do this! We explain it all below, step by step.

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How to Make WhatsApp Safer:

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Because there are no parental controls, none of the settings below will be locked. So, a kid who knows how to navigate the settings can easily undo all of the settings we recommend changing. Please keep that in mind! Sometimes, predators even tell kids how to change settings to make things less safe for them. If you enable the settings below and allow your child to use WhatsApp, please check that all the toggles are still in place.

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Here are 7 WhatsApp settings that make the app safer:

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1. Lock Down Privacy Settings

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Go to Settings → Privacy and adjust the following:

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• Last Seen & Online: Set to My Contacts or Nobody
• Profile Photo: Set to My Contacts
• About: Set to My Contacts or Nobody
• Status: Set to My Contacts or My Contacts Except…

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 This helps prevent strangers from seeing personal info and reduces unwanted attention.

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2. Control Who Can Add Them to Groups

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This is an especially important one!

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• Go to Settings → Privacy → Groups
• Choose “My Contacts” or “My Contacts Except…”

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This prevents kids from being added to group chats by unknown users, which is a major source of inappropriate content and cyberbullying.

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3. Turn Off Disappearing Messages

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• Open Settings → Privacy → Default Message Timer
• Set to Off

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Parents should also check individual chats, since disappearing messages can be enabled per conversation. This helps maintain accountability and transparency.

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4. Disable Location Sharing

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• Go to Settings → Privacy → Live Location
• Review active shares and turn them off

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Location sharing can be risky if a child doesn’t fully understand who can see it.

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5. Restrict Unknown Contacts

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Teach kids how to:

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• Block unknown numbers
• Report suspicious messages
• Avoid responding to messages from people they don’t know—even if the message seems harmless

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WhatsApp allows blocking directly from a chat or via Settings → Privacy → Blocked Contacts.

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6. Enable Two-Step Verification

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• Go to Settings → Account → Two-Step Verification
• Set a PIN and add a parent-controlled email

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This helps protect accounts from hijacking, impersonation, and scams.

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7. Review Media Auto-Download Settings

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• Go to Settings → Storage and Data
• Turn off automatic media downloads

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This reduces the chance of inappropriate images or videos being saved to the phone without the child realizing it.

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Bottom Line: Is WhatsApp Safe for Kids?

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No, not really. 

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WhatsApp is not designed specifically for kids, and it offers very few safeguards for younger users. While its encryption protects privacy, it also makes it difficult for parents to check in and help when something goes wrong.

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For older teens, WhatsApp may be appropriate with clear boundaries, ongoing conversations, and device-level monitoring. For younger kids, it’s just not worth it as the risks often outweigh the benefits.

WhatsApp can be useful, especially for communicating overseas, but it requires intentional parenting, regular check-ins, and strong digital boundaries. Parents should not assume that “private” means “safe.” For messaging apps, the reverse is often true.

What if I have more questions? How can I stay up to date?

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Two actions you can take!

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1. Subscribe to our tech trends newsletter, the PYE Download. About every 3 weeks, we’ll share what’s new, what the PYE team is up to, and a message from Chris.
2. Ask your questions in our private parent community called The Table! It’s not another Facebook group. No ads, no algorithms, no asterisks. Just honest, critical conversations and deep learning! For parents who want to “go slow” together. Become a member today!

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