Instagram Introduces Map, Reposts, and Friends Section: Here's the Lowdown
Meta, Instagram's parent company, announced several new updates to the Instagram app on Thursday, aiming to enhance social interaction and content sharing. The updates focus on notable new features for reposts, location sharing, and a Friends tab in Reels.
Reposts: A New Way to Share Content
Instagram now allows users to easily repost public feed posts and video reels to their own profiles, similar to features on TikTok or Twitter. Reposts appear in a dedicated repost tab on the user's profile and are also shared to followers' feeds, while still crediting the original content creator. Users can add a note with their repost to provide context or commentary. This feature aims to help creators reach a wider audience.
Location Sharing and Instagram Map
Instagram introduced an interactive map that lets users share their last active location with followers or friends they choose, comparable to Snapchat’s Snap Map. The shared location updates only when the user opens the app, so it's not real-time tracking. Users can opt out anytime. The map also lets users explore location-based content such as stories or reels posted from nearby events or places by their friends or creators. Additionally, users can post short messages called "Notes" on specific locations in the map for others to see. This feature enhances coordination among friends and discovery of local happenings.
Friends Tab in Reels: A Focus on Personal Connections
Instagram added a “Friends” tab inside the Reels section to make it easier to view and engage with reels shared by close friends and followers. This helps users focus on content from their inner network rather than the broader public feed, improving connectivity through personalized content sharing and discovery. Users can hide their own likes and comments on Reels and mute activity bubbles from specific people they follow in the Friends tab. They can also choose to share their Reels activity with "no one" in the Friends tab settings.
These updates reflect Instagram’s effort to enhance social interaction by making it easier to share, discover, and engage with both content and people through reposts, location-aware exploration, and more focused social feed options in Reels. Users can now repost Reels from public profiles and in-feed posts to share with their own followers, while the reposted content is credited to the original poster. The Friends tab in Reels can be found at the top of the Reels tab and began rolling out earlier this year. Parents with supervision set up for their teens on Instagram have control over their teen's location sharing experience on the map, and parents receive a notification if their teen starts sharing their location. Location sharing on the new Instagram map is completely off by default.
Users can choose to responsibly share their location with friends they pick using the new Instagram map, while having the option to share their locations in Instagram stories for 24 hours. Users can decide whether their teen has access to location sharing on the map and see who their teen is sharing their location with. Users can edit or opt out of the Friends Reels activity feature in their Settings and activity page.
With these updates, Instagram continues to evolve, providing users with new ways to connect, share, and discover content.
- Technology is utilized in the new Instagram updates to enable users to repost public feed posts, video reels, and Reels from other profiles, similar to features on TikTok or Twitter.
- Social-media interactions are enhanced with the Friends tab in Reels, which allows users to focus on content from their close friends and followers, leading to improved personal connections and discovery of content.
