Amid the frenetic CES news cycle, Instagram has revealed that significant changes are coming to our homepage feeds. A new feature offers us three different feeds to explore when opening the app.
While the default Homepage feed isn't going anywhere, it will be joined by two new feeds that will almost certainly prove popular with the masses using Instagram.
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These new feeds were revealed by Instagram head Adam Mosseri, who posted his announcement on both Instagram and Twitter today.
In a short video, Mosseri explains that Instagram is now testing the "ability to switch between three different views on your home screen". New feeds include the default Home feed, which is added by new Favorites and Followers feeds.
The homepage feed will be the same one you are already using. This is where Instagram will rank content based on what it believes each individual user will most want to see.
Material in this feed will be presented out of chronological order; instead, it will be sorted according to what Instagram finds most relevant to you.
The Favorites feed is pretty self-explanatory, but this is where users will see content from accounts that are important to them. It looks like users will set their favorites themselves, with Mosseri saying he uses this feed to follow his siblings, some of his favorite creators, and some of his best friends.
Mosseri did not explain how users will set their favorites, nor did he reveal how many favorites each user can have, if there is any limit.
The third and final feed will be as follows. This is where you'll find posts from just the accounts you follow. Mosseri suggests the Followers feed is necessary because the Home feed will have “more and more recommendations over time”.
It is important to note that the Favorites and Followers feeds will be in chronological order, which will likely make many Instagram users happy.
Years ago, Instagram abandoned chronological feeds, much to the annoyance of many of its users. While the once-controversial Home feed isn't going anywhere, it's good to see that chronological feeds will be making a comeback.
Keep in mind, however, that these new feeds are only in testing for now. It looks like Instagram is planning to roll out this test to certain users over the next few weeks, but we'll have to wait a while before rolling out the feeds to everyone.
Mosseri says Instagram expects to launch these new feeds in the first half of 2022, which is a pretty wide release window. We'll let you know when the company shares more details, so stay tuned.