How to Log into WhatsApp using a Desktop

OCTOBER 28, 2024 • EXPERT OPINION • AFFILIATE MARKETING

WhatsApp is the most popular mobile messenger worldwide, used by more than 2 billion people. To integrate your work into it, you will need to access its web version. However, logging in from a desktop often raises questions for users. How do you log into WhatsApp from a laptop? Can an account be linked using an Android or iPhone? Is it possible to log in without a phone? And most importantly, how can you manage multiple WhatsApp accounts using a single browser? This guide breaks it all down for you.

Recently, WhatsApp changed its stance on accessing a single account from multiple devices. You can now log into the same account from up to five devices: one primary device and four additional ones. To do this, you need to access the web version of WhatsApp on a desktop. Here’s how to do it:

1. Go to the WhatsApp Web website.
2. Choose Link with phone number.

3. Specify your country and phone number.

4. A verification code and instructions on linking your desktop to your WhatsApp account will appear on the screen. Enter the code in the app on your smartphone to log into your account on the web version.

You are now logged into WhatsApp on your desktop.

To log into WhatsApp Web on Android, follow these steps:

1. Open WhatsApp on your smartphone and tap the three dots in the top right corner of the screen.
2. Select Linked devices from the dropdown menu.

3. Click on Link a device.

4. A scanner will open on your smartphone. Click OK and scan the QR code displayed on the screen with WhatsApp Web open.

Now you can receive and send messages on WhatsApp through the web version. To view which devices are linked to your account, go to the Linked devices section.

Connecting WhatsApp Web to an iPhone is slightly different. To link your account to an iPhone, follow these steps on your smartphone:

1. Log into the WhatsApp app and select Settings at the bottom right.
2. Tap Linked devices.

3. Click Link a device.

4. A scanner will automatically open on your smartphone. Hold it up to the laptop screen with WhatsApp Web open to scan the QR code.

All done, you have linked your desktop to your WhatsApp account on iPhone.

Previously, using WhatsApp Web on a desktop required a constant Internet connection on your smartphone. Now, it’s enough to log into the web version just once using your phone number or QR code as described above to access your WhatsApp chats. After one-time verification, all messages will sync automatically even if your phone is offline.

If you’re used to switching between WhatsApp accounts on your smartphone, you need to know that the web version doesn’t allow simultaneous use of multiple accounts. You can, however, use special tools like the anti-detect browser Octo for this.

Anti-detect technology replaces the browser fingerprint, a unique set of device parameters used by anti-fraud systems, including WhatsApp Web, to identify users. This digital fingerprint includes the OS version, installed fonts, screen resolution, geolocation, language, timezone, RAM and storage capacity, CPU core count and media devices, GPU model, hardware noise levels, and more.

For example, a user may visit a website through Google Chrome version 130. Their laptop runs on Windows 11, with 16 GB of RAM and an eight-core processor, and has English and Portuguese languages installed and GMT-3 as the timezone. While these parameters individually are common, the likelihood of all 50+ characteristics matching across different users is low, allowing WhatsApp to identify individual users with 94% accuracy.

An anti-detect (multi-accounting) browser creates virtual profiles, each appearing to WhatsApp Web as a separate device. With an anti-detect browser, you don’t need to log out of one WhatsApp account to log into another. You can create a separate virtual profile for each WhatsApp account and be logged into them all at the same time using a single browser.

An anti-detect browser can also be installed on multiple devices. Even if you log in from different devices using an anti-detect browser, WhatsApp’s anti-fraud system won’t notice this, and you won’t need to verify logins from additional laptops. This helps you bypass the limitation on the number of devices linked to an account.

In Octo Browser, you can create a virtual profile in five ways, but here we’ll describe the quickest one. Read more about other methods here.

Go to the Profiles section and select Quick Profile.

The browser will create a virtual profile with randomized digital fingerprint parameters. The only setting retained from your actual device is the operating system. This will help prevent the fingerprint from raising suspicions with WhatsApp’s anti-fraud system.

To prevent WhatsApp from linking your accounts because of the same IP address, you need to spoof it using a proxy. You can always buy proxies at a discount from our partners.

Click Direct — Set a new proxy.

Select the proxy type, enter the IP address, host, login, and password. If you use a proxy with a dynamic IP, enter the link for changing the IP address, check the box Save to the Proxy Manager, and provide a name for the proxy. Click Confirm.

The browser will automatically check the connection and highlight the IP address in green if everything is correct.

Anti-fraud systems consider browser profiles without cookies suspicious. To increase the trustworthiness of your WhatsApp accounts, you need to prep (“warm up”) your virtual profiles.

If you’re logging into an existing WhatsApp account, export the cookies from the browser you previously used to log into the account, using an extension like Cookie Editor for Chrome. Go to Octo Browser, click the three dots, and select Import Cookies from the dropdown menu.

Drag and drop .txt or .json files, or paste them as plain text. Click Confirm.

If you are creating a new WhatsApp account, prep it using the Cookie Robot. To do this, click the three dots and select Cookie Robot. Paste links to popular websites in the country corresponding to the proxy you are using. Click Confirm.

The Robot will visit each site and spend 5–15 seconds there without performing additional actions. If there are errors in the links, the bot will simply skip them. When the prepping is complete, the Start button will change from Auto to Start. After this, you can launch the profile and register a new WhatsApp account.

To log into other accounts on WhatsApp Web, repeat all these steps.

WhatsApp allows you to log into the same account from one primary device and four additional devices. To do this, you need to link them using a phone number or QR code. If you want to log into multiple accounts simultaneously, you need to use proxies and an anti-detect browser, such as Octo. With it, you can create virtual profiles for each WhatsApp account and manage multiple accounts with a single browser. Even if you access Octo from another device, you won’t need to log into WhatsApp Web again. This way, you can bypass the limit on WhatsApp linked devices.