WhatsApp Rolls Out Ephemeral 'Incognito' Conversations With Meta AI Chatbot

WhatsApp on Wednesday launched private "incognito" conversations with its Meta AI chatbot, the first major AI product with no logs of conversations stored on servers. Mark Zuckerberg announced the new Incognito Chat on May 13, 2026. " Zuckerberg added that Incognito Chat handles all AI inference in a Trusted Execution Environment that ensures messages are not accessible to the company.

Messages disappear after users leave their chat session and are not saved in users' chat history. This differs from other disappearing AI products where conversation logs often remain on servers for many months.

The feature uses end-to-end encryption equivalent technology based on Private Processing. Incognito Chat is built on Private Processing technology launched in 2025. It will roll out over the coming months in WhatsApp and the Meta AI app.

Incognito Chat is initially text-only. It includes a web search feature that is on by default but can be turned off and operates in an anonymized way. Meta AI reached 1 billion users across its apps in May 2025, Zuckerberg said.

WhatsApp has more than 3 billion users around the world. Meta is on track to spend $145 billion on AI infrastructure in 2026. Zuckerberg said he is proud that Meta Superintelligence Labs is the first lab to deliver private AI.

"Incognito Chat with Meta AI is truly private, meaning no one — not even Meta — can read your conversations," he stated. Will Cathcart, the head of WhatsApp, said people wanted private conversations with AI on sensitive subjects including health, relationships and finances.

"We've heard from a lot of people that they feel some discomfort about sharing personal information with the company, yet they want the answers," Cathcart said.

Cathcart said the technology behind incognito mode is the equivalent of end-to-end encryption. He said Incognito Chat may work on developing an option to retain some conversations for users who want history. Support for image processing and voice recognition is in the works, Cathcart added.

Google keeps data from temporary chats in Gemini for up to 72 hours. Temporary chats in ChatGPT can be stored for up to 30 days. Incognito chats in Claude are kept for a minimum of 30 days. Prof Alan Woodward, a cyber security expert at Surrey University, said there was a low risk of compromising WhatsApp's existing security by introducing a second system.

He said there was a risk of a lack of accountability for the AI's responses because disappearing messages cannot be retrieved. "Personally I think what you ask an AI should remain private as some people ask it very personal matters - but you are placing a great deal of trust in the AI not to lead users astray," Woodward said.

When Meta AI was added to WhatsApp last year, it was criticised by some users angry at not being able to turn it off.

Cathcart said Meta AI's guardrails would err on the side of caution in refusing to answer requests which could be interpreted as harmful or illegal. WhatsApp has blocked other AI chatbots from being accessible from its systems.