Last Updated on December 14, 2020

Seeing “Waiting for this message. This may take a while” on WhatsApp chat is really annoying especially when you needed to look up on the contents of the chat. This greatly shows up on WhatsApp group chats. Yet, you still keep wondering why does it show.

Why does WhatsApp shows “Waiting for this message. This may take a while”

According to WhatsApp, this happens as a result of their end-to-end encryption, you may need to wait for someone’s message to arrive because your group member’s/contact phone needs to come online and properly encrypt the message for you.

This can typically occur if you or the person you’re chatting with recently reinstalled WhatsApp or cleared WhatsApp chats.

In other to fasten your chats to be received, you only need to ask the person you are messaging to open WhatsApp on their phone so as to encrypt the message.

Image / MemeGenerator

The worst scenario is especially in group chats. In a situation where one will post a chat and immediately goes offline for over 3 weeks.

There’s no special trick to avoid the message than to call your friend or wait till he/she comes online.