How to Add Dark Mode in WhatsApp for Desktop

WhatsApp is one of the most popular messaging and VoIP apps available today. Originally started only for Android smartphone, now it is available for all the possible platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows and there is also a web version of WhatsApp that can be used straight from any web browser.

Even though the desktop version of WhatsApp allows you to do everything that you can do from its smartphone app, it lacks the dark mode that can be enabled through developer options in the Android version of the app. If you want to have the dark mode or dark theme in WhatsApp Desktop, then you can use a patch created by open-source developer m4heshd. It works both on Windows and macOS. Here is how:

Note: This method does not work with the Microsoft Store version of WhatsApp. You have to manually download and install WhatsApp for Desktop from https://www.whatsapp.com/download/.

1. Launch WhatsApp for Desktop in your computer.
2. Download WADark ZIP archive from https://github.com/m4heshd/whatsapp-desktop-dark/releases.
3. Extract the contents of the downloaded ZIP file to a folder and double-click on WADark.exe.
4. It will start doing its work – detect WhatsApp location find app.asar archive, replace files in this archive and relaunch WhatsApp. When the patching is complete, you can press a key to terminate its window.
5. Now WhatsApp will launch in the dark mode automatically.

WADark replaces files inside the “app.asar” archive. You can replace these files manually too using 7-Zip with ASAR plugin, but WADark does everything automatically. Since the files are patched, the dark mode is hardcoded and cannot be changed back to the light mode without restoring the original “app.asar” file. There are two ways in which you can restore the original files and hence the light mode – first method is by reinstalling WhatsApp all over again and second by running WADark again as it creates a backup of the original files. When you launch WADark, it gives you option to restore the original files.