14 DAY TRIAL // WhatsApp is believed to be working on a major update that would allow users to enable the same account (with the same phone number) on more than just one device.
At this point, if you activate one WhatsApp account associated to a specific phone number on one device, all the other instances of the service are automatically blocked. In other words, you can only use WhatsApp on one mobile device and on your PC with the dedicated apps or WhatsApp Web in the browser.
But this could all change very soon, according to a rumor posted by WABetaInfo, as WhatsApp could be working on a whole new system that would make it possible to enable and use the same account on more than just one device.
WhatsApp is currently developing dedicated apps for Windows 10 that would enable PC users to chat on the messaging service without an active connection to the PC. This means that a new WhatsApp session on the same phone number would be activated on the computer, so even if your phone no longer has an Internet connection, you should still be able to send and receive messages on the desktop.
Multiple devices per each account
This makes WhatsApp Web and dedicated desktop apps a little bit redundant, albeit they could come in handy on devices where the new Windows 10 UWP app is not installed. There’s no word on such capabilities coming to macOS for the time being.
WhatsApp Web works by syncing with the mobile phone, so it needs an active Internet connection on the mobile device.
Thanks to the new system, WhatsApp will push sent and received messages to all devices configured for a specific account, so you can, for instance, start chatting on one device and continue from where you left off on another. This will be supported on both Android and iOS (an iPad version of WhatsApp with such features is also in the works, it seems), so messages will be synced across both platforms, making the migration from one to another easier.
No ETA has been provided for the time being, but it looks like WhatsApp has been working on this feature for quite a while, so a potential release by the end of the year wouldn’t necessarily be surprising.