WhatsApp Web Dark Mode: embrace the darkness with a little bit of help from a user script
We've finally got Dark Mode for WhatsApp Web. Or not. It exists, but you can't activate it easily. Here's what you'll need.
WhatsApp has finally done it. Dark Mode has been built into the web end of the most used messenger outside of China. But it's not active. Not yet. With a little bit of hacking, you can turn your web client into a dark messenger. Or you can use the settings, which are already activated for some users.
The manual way: right click, inspect
Dark Mode can be activated with a simple trick. I'm using Google Chrome, but the other major browsers work exactly the same.
- Open the WhatsApp Web Client.
Log in.
- Wait until your messages are loaded.
- Right click in the empty space next to the message box.
- Select «Inspect» from the menu.
- A developer console will pop up. You'll see the CSS class «web» above the body.
- Double click on «web» and replace it with «web dark»
And boom! That's all it takes.
Too complicated? Let's try user script
If the previous solution's too complicated for you, you try another option:
- Install Tampermonkey.
- Install the tkore user script, better known as Tal Koren.
- Reload WhatsApp Web.
And you've got a new WhatsApp. Not as weird as mine, but still.
Update: there's an even simpler option
Turns out that some users can directly access the settings.
- Open the WhatsApp Web Client.
- Log in.
- Wait until your messages are loaded.
- Click on the three dots next to your user pic.
- Go to «Settings».
- Go to «Theme».
- And select Dark Mode.
However, this function hasn't yet been rolled out widely. Not all users have access to it yet. It won't work for me. If it does for you, I'd use the official settings.
Thanks to Kev89, Anonymous and xkukurusa for the advice.
Journalist. Author. Hacker. A storyteller searching for boundaries, secrets and taboos – putting the world to paper. Not because I can but because I can’t not.