According to TheKarachiite, “The app has now lit up double tick marks in a luminescent blue shade when a message has been read. This has lead to a huge difference in how users of the popular messaging service stay in touch with friends. Users are also provided with the option to long press a message to access the ‘Message Info’ screen (an encircled ‘i’ at the top of the screen), which details the times of when the message was received, read or played.

Still, people have found some clever ways to disable the WhatsApp blue ticks.

According to foreign media reports, the simplest way is also the most obvious, ‘don’t use WhatsApp’. Or if it’s that important then go to WhatsApp notification settings, Pop-Up Notifications and select ‘Only when screen off’. Now, when you next get a message your screen will illuminate with a message pop-up. You’ll have the option to ‘View’ or ‘Close’ but hitting either one of these will change the marks from gray to blue. What you want to do is hit the home button on your phone instead.

Another way is to use WhatsApp widget, long press a blank space on your home screen to bring up the widget manager. Add the WhatsApp widget to your home screen and when new messages come in, even ones that are several lines long, you will be able to read them in the widget without affecting the blue check marks. Of course, if you tap the message in the widget it will launch the app.