WhatsApp is used by over 1.2 billion people worldwide and 200 million in India alone. However, it can become an annoyance too when it downloads all the media files automatically, from pictures to videos too, more recently, GIFs, not to mention audio files and videos. These not only clutter the phone’s gallery and music player but also eat up a lot of storage and data. Here’s how you can stop WhatsApp from automatically saving audio and photos on your phone. Ways to Stop Auto Downloading, saving of media content on Whatsapp for AndroidWhatsApp for Android has a switch that lets you stop videos and images from downloading. Here’s how you can do it:
Open WhatsApp, tap > Settings.Now tap Chat settings > Media auto-download. You’ll see three options: When using cellular data When roaming and When connected on Wi-Fi. Tap each one and disable auto-downloads by unchecking all three options – Audio, Images and Video.You will have to download photos to view them. When you do, WhatsApp saves them in a folder, which is visible to anyone who open’s your phone’s Gallery App. Also Read: Huawei Mate X foldable phone set to launch today at MWC Barcelona: All about Galaxy Fold rival How to Stop Auto Downloading and Saving of Videos, pictures and Other Media on WhatsApp for iPhoneYou can turn off media auto-download on iPhone, via the Settings menu.
Open WhatsApp, tap the Settings button and tap on Data and Storage UsageIn this menu, there is Media Auto-Download option on topFor Audio, photos, Videos, and Documents, select the Never optionOn phone, only the files chosen to download manually will appear and you can even choose to stop the photos and videos from appearing the phone’s Camera Roll. All you need to do is to go to Chats in the Settings, open the Save to Camera Roll menu, and turn it to off. This stops the pictures people are sending from showing up in the camera roll and also taking over your synced Photo Stream.
Not saving images automatically has its own advantages. But that also means that you will have to download each photo manually. If you end up downloading each and every image, then it’s probably best to leave this feature active.

Source: financialexpress.com