You may have many reasons to hide your phone number on WhatsApp. The most prominent of these are privacy and security. When you are added to a WhatsApp group against your will, your phone number becomes visible to everyone in the group. By preventing this, we will talk about how you can perform the WhatsApp number hiding process.
WhatsApp number hiding: Why should it be hidden?
You may have many reasons for wanting your phone number to be hidden on WhatsApp. To mention these:
- If some people use WhatsApp specifically for business purposes and do not want strangers to contact them, they may prefer to keep their phone numbers private.
- By hiding your phone number on WhatsApp, you can prevent hackers or scammers from accessing your personal information or contacting you with fake messages.
- Finally, if you have shared your phone number with a large number of people, you may receive unwanted messages or calls from people you do not know or do not want to talk to. By hiding your phone number, you can prevent communicating with unwanted people on WhatsApp.
Ways to hide WhatsApp number
Hiding WhatsApp number via Settings
WhatsApp cares deeply about the security of its users. For this reason, it constantly adds different features to the main application. Security is the biggest concern that almost all of us care about. Despite this, WhatsApp does not yet have a “hide contact” feature. Nevertheless, it will be enough to perform a few operations that correspond to the same feature.
The steps you need to take to hide your number on WhatsApp are as follows:
- Open the WhatsApp application on your phone.
- Tap on the gear icon (Settings) located in the bottom right corner of the screen.
- Go to the section labeled Account.
- Tap on Privacy from the options.
- Tap on the section labeled About in the options that appear.
- Select Nobody from here.
To mention a few details here, it seems more reasonable to choose My Contacts rather than Nobody. Because those in your contact list are already people you know. Therefore, there seems to be no need to hide your phone number from them. Still, if you say, ‘It doesn’t matter if I know them or not. I want to hide my number from everyone,’ then Nobody will be the option you should choose.
With this option, when you are in a WhatsApp group, no one else will be able to see your phone number. This means you have taken a good step towards protecting your privacy.
Hiding WhatsApp number with a Google Voice phone number
Another method you can resort to for hiding your WhatsApp number is using a virtual phone number. You can use a Google Voice phone number to make free calls, text messages, and communicate via call forwarding. Additionally, you can use Google Voice to hide your phone number on WhatsApp.
First of all, you need to install the Google Voice application. Now let’s move on to the steps for downloading and installing the virtual phone number service on Google:
- Go to the Google Play Store or App Store and search for the Google Voice application. Then download and install the application.
- The next step involves registering your account. Therefore, first log in to your Google account, or if you have already logged in, tap on the “Continue as [Account-Name]” option.
- Now, after spending some time with the terms and conditions, tap on the Accept option.
- At this stage, you need to select a location to link with your virtual phone number to hide your phone number.
- Search for the location by region or city according to your choice. When you find your preferred place, choose the Select option.
- Now, after following the Google wizard instructions, you can get the Google virtual number.
After this, the only thing left is the verification of your phone number. You will see how to do this below:
- Open WhatsApp on your phone and open the menu in the top right corner by tapping on the three dots.
- Go to the Settings submenu from the menu.
- Now tap on your profile photo. If your number is verified, it is shown here. If it is not verified, continue following the instructions below.
- Follow the Settings > Account sequence.
- Here, when you tap on the Change Number option, you will see a warning; proceed by tapping Next.
- Enter your new phone number and current numbers in the relevant fields and tap Next.
- Now, continue after choosing who will be notified about the change.
- We are left with only the verification of your new number. Whether you change the number or open a new WhatsApp account, this step is required in both cases.
- You can receive the OTP SMS and code directly from the Google Voice application. After entering this code into WhatsApp, you will have completed the verification process.
Use a WhatsApp Business Account
For those who run a business and want to keep their personal phone number separate, WhatsApp offers a solution with the Business account. With a WhatsApp Business account, you can use a separate business phone number to communicate with your customers.
By having a dedicated business phone number, you ensure a clear distinction between your personal and business contacts. This way, you can protect your personal phone number while continuing to use WhatsApp for business purposes.
However, it is important to remember that this option is only valid for individuals who have a business and aim to use a separate phone number for business-related communication.