On practically every smartphone the main app, the heaviest one, the one that drains the most battery and the one that distracts us the most, is definitely Whatsapp. While for other apps such as Facebook we have seen several alternatives, Whatsapp is essential, you can't really do without it and you can't keep it disabled from remaining in the background, otherwise you would no longer receive messages.
The only thing that can be done to limit its impact on the phone's resources, especially on the battery and on the internal memory space, is to disable the automatic saving of images, photos and videos that are received in chats.
Avoiding the automatic download of the files received via Whatsapp, both on Android and on the iPhone, also allows you to save data traffic for those who have subscriptions with the consumption limit and to ensure that all the various photos and videos received do not appear in the roll or in the phone gallery, which is also good for privacy reasons.
To disable the automatic download of files on Android, Samsung, Huawei and all other phones, you can open Whatsapp and access the Settings, going to the Data usage section.
From here you can change the Automatic Download options of video, audio, photo and document files.
For each of these categories of files that can be received, you can choose whether to activate the automatic download when connected to the data network, when connected in Wifi, when connected in roaming (from abroad).
By deactivating the automatic download for all or almost all, only the voice messages are downloaded automatically, while for the rest you will need to touch the received photo or video to be able to view it on the phone.
On Android, however, each photo and video downloaded from Whatsapp is also listed in the Gallery app in a special dedicated folder.
To prevent these files from being visible in the gallery with all the photos taken by us, there is a trick.
You need to use the ES File Manager app, which allows you to browse Android files as you would on Windows with folders.
From ES File Explorer, tap on the internal memory button and then open the following folder path: WhatsApp> Media> WhatsApp Images .
From here, press the button with three dots at the top right, then tap on New> file giving it the name .nomedia (do not forget to put the dot).
Repeat the operation, this time, for the WhatsApp> Media> WhatsApp video folder and for WhatsApp> Media> WhatsApp Animated Gif .
Try opening any app to view photos on your phone, like Google Photos or another, and it will be impossible to find photos, videos and gifs received and saved by Whatsapp.
To restore Whatsapp folders in Gallery apps, delete the created .nomedia files.
To disable the automatic download of photos and videos on iPhone, the procedure is similar to that of Android phones, even if the menu is little different.
Then go to Whatsapp Settings, then go to Data usage and select when automatic saving for photos, videos, audio files and documents should take place.
You can therefore always choose, only in Wifi, or the option Never, to disable the automatic download of everything.
On iPhone there is no need for any trick to prevent photos and videos from appearing in the gallery or in the camera roll .
Just go to Whatsapp Settings, then to Chat and disable the Save media received option.
This option is valid for all chats, but if you only want to deactivate for some conversations, for example those in which some friends send us only stupid memes and funny videos, then you can leave the option active and make the automatic saving is not active only for that specific chat.
Open the conversation, press on the contact name or group name at the top to open the tab and change the option Save media received by setting Never instead of default.
