Does whatsapp show your phone number? Explained

With over one billion users worldwide, whatsapp is the most popular used instant messaging app available on both android and ios, and also on whatsapp web.

WhatsApp is one of the instant messaging apps that requires a phone number and you can’t create a whatsapp account without having an active phone number as you will have to verify your whatsapp using a ussd code.

Because of the fact that whatsapp requires a phone number some users are not comfortable using their main number for their whatsapp account.

This brings about the common question being asked on the internet and among whatsapp user.

Does whatsapp show your phone number?

WhatsApp will indeed show your phone number in WhatsApp chat, calls or in whatsapp group, and bear in mind that anyone who have you on whatsapp already have your phone number.

However, I will ask if you should concern about whatsapp showing your number while calling someone or texting someone on whatsapp.

Definitely whatsapp will show you number as it works with phone number.

If you are not comfortable about whatsapp showing your number while making a whatsapp call or texting someone, then you shouldn’t use whatsapp and instead use the likes of Skype, Facebook messenger, Google voice, viber, line, etc.

These other instant messaging apps won’t show your number during call or chat messages.


Related Post: 7 Advantages of whatsapp over texting you should know

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While asking does whatsapp show your phone number on calls or chatting, whatsapp make use of a phone number and there’s no private number feature or anonymous call on whatsapp. 

Now let’s see let’s whatsapp privacy policy as it is very important on the question of does whatsapp show your phone number.

The information whatsapp collect

  • Your Account Information. You must provide your mobile phone number and basic information (including a profile name of your choice) to create a WhatsApp account. If you don’t provide us with this information, you will not be able to create an account to use our Services. You can add other information to your account, such as a profile picture and “about” information.
  • Your Messages. We do not retain your messages in the ordinary course of providing our Services to you. Instead, your messages are stored on your device and not typically stored on our servers. Once your messages are delivered, they are deleted from our servers. The following scenarios describe circumstances where we may store your messages in the course of delivering them:
    • Undelivered Messages. If a message cannot be delivered immediately (for example, if the recipient is offline), we keep it in encrypted form on our servers for up to 30 days as we try to deliver it. If a message is still undelivered after 30 days, we delete it.
    • Media Forwarding. When a user forwards media within a message, we store that media temporarily in encrypted form on our servers to aid in more efficient delivery of additional forwards.

    We offer end-to-end encryption for our Services. End-to-end encryption means that your messages are encrypted to protect against us and third parties from reading them. Learn more about end-to-end encryption and how businesses communicate with you on WhatsApp.

  • Your Connections. You can use the contact upload feature and provide us, if permitted by applicable laws, with the phone numbers in your address book on a regular basis, including those of users of our Services and your other contacts. If any of your contacts aren’t yet using our Services, we’ll manage this information for you in a way that ensures those contacts cannot be identified by us. Learn more about our contact upload feature here. You can create, join, or get added to groups and broadcast lists, and such groups and lists get associated with your account information. You give your groups a name. You can provide a group profile picture or description.
  • Status Information. You may provide us your status if you choose to include one on your account. Learn how to use status on AndroidiPhone, or KaiOS.
  • Transactions And Payments Data. If you use our payments services, or use our Services meant for purchases or other financial transactions, we process additional information about you, including payment account and transaction information. Payment account and transaction information includes information needed to complete the transaction (for example, information about your payment method, shipping details and transaction amount). If you use our payments services available in your country or territory, our privacy practices are described in the applicable payments privacy policy.
  • Customer Support And Other Communications. When you contact us for customer support or otherwise communicate with us, you may provide us with information related to your use of our Services, including copies of your messages, any other information you deem helpful, and how to contact you (e.g., an email address). For example, you may send us an email with information relating to app performance or other issues.
  • Device And Connection Information. We collect device and connection-specific information when you install, access, or use our Services. This includes information such as hardware model, operating system information, battery level, signal strength, app version, browser information, mobile network, connection information (including phone number, mobile operator or ISP), language and time zone, IP address, device operations information, and identifiers (including identifiers unique to Facebook Company Products associated with the same device or account).
  • Location Information. We collect and use precise location information from your device with your permission when you choose to use location-related features, like when you decide to share your location with your contacts or view locations nearby or locations others have shared with you. There are certain settings relating to location-related information which you can find in your device settings or the in-app settings, such as location sharing. Even if you do not use our location-related features, we use IP addresses and other information like phone number area codes to estimate your general location (e.g., city and country). We also use your location information for diagnostics and troubleshooting purposes.
  • Cookies. We use cookies to operate and provide our Services, including to provide our Services that are web-based, improve your experiences, understand how our Services are being used, and customize them. For example, we use cookies to provide our Services for web and desktop and other web-based services. We may also use cookies to understand which of our Help Center articles are most popular and to show you relevant content related to our Services. Additionally, we may use cookies to remember your choices, like your language preferences, to provide a safer experience, and otherwise to customize our Services for you.

You read more on Whatsapp privacy policy.

From the above statement you will see that phone number is very important in whatsapp and definitely whatsapp will show your number to the person you are chatting with or having a video or voice call. And this goes on to answer the question of does whatsapp show your phone number.

How do I hide my number on WhatsApp?

The fact is that a whatsapp user cannot hide his or her number on WhatsApp while chatting or making a call on whatsapp. Both parties phone number will be displayed to each other and this is the policy of whatsapp. 

This is same with the question of does whatsapp show your phone number while chatting or making calls? Yes of course whatsapp will show your number.

WhatsApp isn’t just like the cellular network service where you can hide your number and make a private call, this type of feature isn’t available on whatsapp as at this time of writing this article. Maybe in the future they will add the private number feature to whatsapp.

I found out that many whatsapp users are looking for a way to hide their number while making calls or sending a message on whatsapp, but I’m soory to disappoint you because the private number feature isn’t available on whatsapp.

So no need asking how do I hide my number on WhatsApp or does whatsapp show your phone number because indeed you cannot hide your number on WhatsApp and also whatsapp will always show your number to the person you are calling or chatting with.

Who can see about and phone number in WhatsApp?

A person that has your whatsapp number will see your whatsapp status, about and whatsapp number unless you go ahead to hide about on your whatsapp account.

To hide your whatsapp about, kindly open your whatsapp messenger app, tap on the hamburger menu and select settings.

Click on Account and select Privacy by tapping on it.

You will see About among the options shown to you. Open it and select nobody if you don’t want anyone to see your whatsapp about page, or you can select my contacts and only those you have their whatsapp number will be able to see your whatsapp about page.

does whatsapp show your phone number

Remember when you disable whatsapp about page, your whatsapp number will still be shown to those who have your whatsapp number, whom you call or have a chat with.

Some do think that disabling whatsapp about page will hide their whatsapp number but that isn’t the case as I myself have confirmed it.

Can you be private on WhatsApp?

No, you can never be private on WhatsApp when it comes to making a call or having a chat, your number will be shown to the person you are having a chat with or calling. You can only hide your whatsapp status, last seen, profile picture, location, etc.

But to hide your whatsapp number is not available because whatsapp will always show your phone number to a third party.

If you want to very private with WhatsApp then you can add whatsapp to secure folder if you have that in your phone and this will prevent a third party from having access to your whatsapp unless the person knows your secure folder password.

Can you make an anonymous call on Whatsapp?

I’m sorry you can’t make anonymous call on whatsapp because whatsapp will always show you phone number to the person you are calling. That is to say that you can’t hide your number while calling someone on whatsapp. 

As this time of writing this article, there’s nothing like private number calls on whatsapp. And with this I draw the conclusion on the question of the day, does whatsapp show your phone number while chatting or making a call.

About Kennedy

I'm Amaechi Uchenna by name, a mobile tech enthusiast who love writing articles about tips and tutorials especially relating to gadgets.

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