Truecaller, the popular caller ID app got a fresh facelift that declutters the calls and SMS sections, a new full-screen identification as well as a smart SMS organiser.
With close to 150 million active users, India accounts for two-thirds of all Truecaller users around the world. The new update is based on the most prevalent feedback given by its Indian community.
The biggest change comes with the redesign of the number identification pop-up. It has been made cleaner and better optimised for more Android phones, where the visual elements may be in different places. A new fullscreen option is also available which can be used instead of the dialler, which shows all the information of a person during a call. It is also colour coded, so users can know if it is an important call or spam by a glance. This can be enabled by going into Settings > Caller ID > Fullscreen.
Truecaller can also act as a hub for all your calls, texts as well as a chatting platform. Content is divided into four main screens — Personal, important, others, spam. The ‘important’ section includes texts relating to banking and payments, travel, etc. The app smartly understands where any notification should reside. In the rare case of an incorrect classification, users can manually change it as well as report from within the app as a rectification.
Truecaller Pay allows users to conduct micro-transactions from within the app. It can also be used with other UPI-based payment systems. There are a few in-app partners such as RedBus.in where users can directly check deals and pay, but it doesn’t aim to become a marketplace on its own in the future. Instead, it is looking to get more partners on board.
Contrary to popular belief, Truecaller does not upload users’ contact books to its servers to get information for all users. This is primarily achieved by a user-sourced directory. In fact, all functions and features of the app happen on the device, without needing to send data to the servers (except during UPI registration). All the data and banking details of Indian users is stored locally in India in an encrypted format.
For consumers looking to highlight themselves as well as get more features, Truecaller Gold is also available. It highlights you each time you call someone, offers advanced spam protection, automatically updates the list of contacts that are spam and even automatically disallows spam calls to ever reach your phone.
Most of these features are already rolling out to its Android users in India. iPhone users do not get all the same benefits due to the limitations of the platform.
