Users who send a message and then realize they want to swap out a word, fix a typo or delete the message altogether can now do so in the Snapchat app. The company announced the new feature Monday and is set to roll out to users around the globe within the next several weeks.
Whether the messages were sent in a private message or in a group chat, users can delete them fairly easily. Even if the message was viewed or saved by someone else in the chat, the user who sent it can still delete it.
While Snapchat's messages—including photos and videos—have always disappeared, it has never been in the sender's control when the message would disappear.
How to delete a message sent in Snapchat:
First, users should update their app to make sure they have the new feature. Users who send a message and then decide after the fact they wish they hadn't will soon have the power to simply delete that message.
All users have to do to delete the message is open up the conversation they want to alter and scroll to the message they want to delete. Then they should press the message and hold it down until the option to delete it appears.
Once the user selects delete, whatever media they wanted gone will disappear from the chat. Friends in that chat will be alerted that something was deleted, but they won't be able to see what it was.
Deleting a message can't stop a friend in the app from screenshotting it before a user gets a chance to delete it.
Users seemed pleased with the introduction of the new unsend feature and were taking to Twitter to talk about it.
u can now delete/unsend messages on snapchat. rt to save a life.
— nikhil (@thenikhilkapur) June 11, 2018
This update to the app came a few months after a complete redesign that sparked outrage from some users. Some of the people who use Snapchat found the new design difficult to navigate even though it was intended to make a distinction between the personal and creator content in the app.
Snap has maintained that once users get used to the update, it will be better overall. "A change this big to existing behavior comes with some disruption, especially given the high frequency of daily engagement of our community," Evan Spiegel, CEO at Snap Inc., said as part of his remarks during 2018's Q1 earnings call.
Snap Inc. also includes Snap's camera glasses called Spectacles. The company has suffered blows to its stock price since going public in 2017.
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