WhatsApp's latest free update is great for iPhone owners

WhatsApp updates its phone app so frequently that if we go a few days without a new version we start wondering if something's happened to the team. And this week's update is a good one, especially if you're an iPhone owner.

The latest version introduces some key improvements to the camera, to status updates and on iPhone, to the home screen. It also promises to deliver some useful AI enhancements in a forthcoming release.

What's new in this week's WhatsApp update

The most obvious new feature is the new home screen widget for iPhone. You can add the widget as you would any other, and it provides you with a choice of Recents, Favourites, Pinned or Frequently Contacted for fast access to your most important chats.

The WhatsApp Camera has been updated too. Now, when you're taking photos or recording video from inside the app you can zoom between 0.5x and 3x.

There's been a tweak to Status updates too. You can now mention other users by tapping the @ button in the status composer.

As ever with WhatsApp updates these features are rolling out in stages, so they might not be in your app immediately.

Another new feature that isn't here yet looks very interesting: code found by the eagle-eyed inspectors at WABetaInfo suggests that there's a new feature coming that will deliver "chat memory" for Meta AI. It appears to be a digital assistant that can remember key details about you – for example, if you're vegetarian, have allergies or dislike specific foods – so when you look for particular kinds of content it can find the most relevant results.

If that sounds rather like Microsoft's controversial Recall and Google's Pixel Screenshots, you're right – so the key here is going to be how much control you're going to have on the information that's stored and where it's shared.