How to stop the autosaving of images and WhatsApp videos on your iPhone

Every day, more than sixty million messages are sent through the WhatsApp instant messaging platform, both from iOS and Android devices or from web and desktop applications. There are many reasons for its popularity, but without a doubt, one of the most important is that it allows sending and receiving rich text messages, images and videos. However, this feature can end up reducing your mobile data plan, or taking up precious space in the storage of your iPhone. Fortunately, you can cancel the automatic download of photos and videos to the reel of your iPhone, in this way you can control both the data consumption and the remaining storage space on your device.

Cancel automatic download of media files

By default, when you receive images and videos from your WhatsApp contacts, they are automatically stored in the photo reel of your iPhone. Thus, your device can end up full of stupid memes and other images and / or videos that, perhaps, you do not want to have stored. Here we tell you how to easily avoid this default behavior.

• First of all, start the WhatsApp application on your iPhone. Press the Settings icon (the small gear wheel) that you will see in the lower right corner of the screen. And now select the Chat section. In the Save to reel option, press the slider to activate or, in this case, deactivate automatic saving.

Once you have deactivated the automatic download of images and videos on WhatsApp, you can decide in each specific case whether or not you want to download the multimedia file that has been sent to you. Also, if you have an iPhone with 3D Touch function, simply press firmly on the photo or video in question to access the Save option.

Alternatively, you can also access the Save option by pressing the photo or video and selecting the Share icon that you will see in the lower left corner of the screen.