The social media platform introduced better previews of users’ content, outside of Instagram
Instagram is working on providing new ways for users to sort their feeds, including bringing back the chronological option.
When Instagram launched in 2010, users were able to view their feeds chronologically. However, that changed when Instagram introduced the ranking-based algorithmic feed in 2016.
“We want people to have meaningful control over their experience. We’ve been experimenting with Favorites, a way for you to decide whose posts you want to see higher up, and we’re working on another option to see posts from people you follow in chronological order” the official Instagram Common account posted on Twitter.
“We want to be clear that we’re creating new options — providing people with more choices so they can decide what works best for them — not switching everyone back to a chronological feed”.
The chronological timeline option as well as all the new ways for users to sort their feeds are expected to be available by early 2022.
Back in 2016, when Instagram disabled the chronological timeline the majority of users were disappointed and expressed great concerns on whether they were willing to continue using the social media app.
Now Instagram decided to offer new features, including prioritizing recent content or posts from your closed accounts, aiming at developing a more delightful user’s experience.
“It is important to me that people have meaningful control over their experience, and I believe a place where you can see everything from the accounts you follow in chronological order is an important thing,” said Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram commenting on the upcoming changes.
As he explained, the updated version of Instagram’s chronological timeline would be different from how it used to be before 2016. Users will have the option to sort their feed chronologically and interact with their favorite accounts first or to show all posts from everyone they follow in chronological order on their feeds.
More details are expected to be announced in the first months of 2022, as well as whether the new features will be automatically available to all users or will be initially limited to specific countries.
Better Previous
Also, last December Instagram presented several new updates to improve the ways users’ content can appear outside the platform.
As the company announced, image previews now appear when someone shares Instagram posts from public accounts to Twitter. “This highlights your content and shows people what they’ll see when they click your link. Our goal is to create a better experience for people who want to see a preview of Instagram content while scrolling on Twitter” said Instagram in a press release.
In addition to sharing previews on Twitter, users can also embed their Instagram profiles on a website. Instagram had enabled posts from public accounts to be embedded on external websites in the past, but now users can also share previews of their profile and up to six of their most recent images to encourage people to explore more.
This feature is now available in the United States, but Instagram is working on expanding to more countries soon.
“We know it’s important for you to be able to control where your Instagram content shows up. You can choose whether your public posts or profile can be embedded on websites outside of Instagram using a new control for embeds, available in settings” Instragam highlighted.
