Arattai v/s WhatsApp - Major differences you should know

Arattai, Zoho’s ‘Made in India’ messaging app is rapidly climbing the top-spot, emerging as a challenger to What’s App. Previously I have written a post on how Zoho’s Arattai – the Desi Player is posing a potential threat to Meta’s Giant What’s App.

This post is like a continuation thread to the previous news story I have written. You can read that article here -> The Desi Takeover.

Although the App seems canonical to What’s App’s interface – there are certain differences which you should know.

Both are Messaging Apps – so how are they actually different?

Both the applications covers the standard set of core messaging services like – text, voice notes, sharing media, facilitating voice and video calls.

However, Arattai has broadened its scope of communication with some notable additions:

Multi-Device Access: Arattai allows a wide range of access on multiple devices including Android TVs – something which What’s App does not currently support. By using the Arattai account, users can now manage that across five different devices simultaneously.
Accessibility: Arattai is a lightweight designed application and functions smoothly even on low network like 2G/3G networks. This allows Arattai to be used even by rural users and those who have budget devices. WhatsApp on the other hand consumes more data and system resources.
The Pocket Feature: Arattai has a dedicated self-chat space where users can store photos, videos, notes, reminders, and other files for personal organizations. It has a dedicated ‘Meetings’ tab for rescheduling video meetings – this is a feature which what’s app lacks. (WhatsApp however passively does this through its ‘You’ chat window where users can self-chat and save media files).

What about the features like Channels and Group Chats? Is Arattai available both on iOS and Android?

Arattai provides ‘Stories’ and ‘broadcast-style Channels’ which merges Messaging with Social Media elements. This one is similar to WhatsApp’s ‘Status’ and ‘Channels’.

Arattai supports group chats as well as one-to-one chats. Maximum group participants allowed within a group is 1,000 members – slightly fewer than WhatsApp’s limit of up to 1,024 members.

Arattai is readily functionable in both iOS and Android devices. You can download it from both Google Play and Apple App Store. It also has multi-device support (as talked earlier) on desktop systems like Windows, macOS, Linux, and even on Android TV.

Now let’s talk about Security

The security of both the applications is based on the implementation of End-to-End Encryption (E2EE).

WhatsApp:- Applies E2EE across all forms of in-app communication, including chat calls, shared files, providing extensive user confidentiality.

Arattai:- As of now, it applies E2EE only to voice and video calls. Text Message encryption isn’t fully implemented but Zoho confirms to expand this protection in the upcoming updates.