Photos, videos, and voice notes in chat

Messages can carry a photo, a video, a voice note, or a file, plus a link preview. A message can carry up to 10 attachments. Everything you attach is as private as the conversation it is in.

Photos#

Photos and videos you pick open together in one review, next to your message: send them, remove one, or Edit a photo to crop or rotate it first. Several photos and videos in one message show as a grid; past four, the last tile shows how many more there are. Open a sent photo to see it at full size and move between the photos and videos in that message.

• In the app, pinch or double-tap to zoom, drag to look around a zoomed photo, swipe sideways for the next one and swipe down to close. Tap once to hide or show the controls. With VoiceOver or TalkBack, swipe up or down on the photo to zoom, and on the position to move between photos.
• On the web, click the right or left side of the photo for the next or previous one, scroll or pinch on the trackpad to zoom where the pointer is, and drag to move around a zoomed photo. The keys are +, - and 0 for zoom, the arrow keys for the next or previous photo, and Esc to close.

In the app, photos are scaled down and compressed on your phone before they upload, which makes sending faster and uses less data. Add original photos and videos skips that step and the crop step, and uploads each photo as it is. The chat still shows every photo at the same size, and a photo sent as an original also keeps that original, at full resolution: anyone who can save the photo gets Download original on the web, and Save original to Photos (iPhone and iPad) or Save original to gallery (Android) in the app, next to the usual download. Before the original is kept, Novagora removes its metadata, such as the location and the camera details, and keeps only which way up the photo goes. The original counts towards your storage.

Attach photos from the composer's attachment menu: Add photo or video on the web, Add photos in the app; on the web the menu also has Add original photos and videos. A photo has no caption of its own: the message you send with it is its caption, and screen readers name each photo by who sent it and where it sits in the message.

A photo may show Attachment processing… for a moment while Novagora prepares it. The message is already sent.

Videos#

Attach a video with Add photo or video on the web or Add video in the app; like a photo, it takes no caption of its own.

Your plan sets the longest and the largest video you can send. A video is checked against both before the upload starts, so one that is too long or too large is refused up front rather than after a long wait. See Plans and credits.

In the app, a video larger than 1080p or recorded at a high bitrate is compressed on your phone before it uploads, so a 4K clip leaves the phone at a fraction of its size. The video shows Compressing… with its progress, and removing it stops the work. Add original photos and videos uploads a video as it is instead, which keeps its own resolution, up to 4K, as the original quality.

A video is processed after upload, and appears once it is ready. If playback fails on an older message, reopen the conversation — the player then fetches a fresh link.

In the app a video plays in your phone's own player: play and pause, scrub, full screen, picture in picture and playback speed. On the web the player has the same controls, skips 15 seconds back or forward, and answers to the keyboard: Space or K to play and pause, J and L to skip, < and > to change speed, F for full screen and M to mute. The speed you choose is remembered for your account, on every device.

Quality is Auto unless you pick one in the quality menu. Every plan plays 720p and below; 1080p and the original quality come with a paid plan, and on Free they are shown with a lock that leads to your plan — see Plans and credits. A video uploaded on Free is kept at 720p and below, so its menu has no 1080p or original for anyone.

Voice notes#

Record a voice note with Record voice note: the microphone button in the composer, or, in a channel in the app, the attachment menu. A voice note can run up to five minutes. While it records, send it with Send voice note or throw it away with Cancel voice note.

To play one, tap play; tap a point on the waveform to jump there (on the web you can also drag along it), and use the speed button to step from 0.5× up to 2×.

Voice recording depends on the device. In a browser that does not support it, the app says so rather than offering a control that does nothing, and on mobile the microphone permission is asked for the first time you record. If permission was denied, the app says microphone access is needed — grant it in your device's own settings.

Files#

Add file attaches a document to a message. It shows in the conversation with its name, and it is as private as the rest of the message. Pictures in a chat are attachments, not library files; see Files and folders.

Link previews#

Paste a link and Novagora fetches a preview — a title, a description, and an image — which is attached to the message. Preview generation happens once per link for you and can fail; the message sends either way, with a plain link.

Saving a photo or video#

Open a photo or video and use the save button to keep a copy on your device. Photos save on every plan; a video someone else sent saves with Pro and Ultra. Your own uploads always save. Whether others can save what you send follows Let others save my photos and videos under Settings → Privacy — see Saving photos and videos.

Who can see an attachment#

An attachment is bound to the conversation. A person in the room can open it; nobody else can, and that stays true after the fact: leaving the room, being removed from it, or having the message deleted ends access to its media.

This is why attachment links are not shareable. Copying an image address out of a conversation and sending it on does not give the other person access — the address is tied to the viewer it was issued to and stops working.

Deleting media#

Deleting a message removes its attachments with it. A moderator removing a channel message does the same. Neither reaches a copy somebody saved to their own device — as with any message anywhere.