Over the last few weeks, Instagram has been on a roll introducing new features to its users. Some are really helpful, others will add to your list of creative opportunities, but all are sure to increase your Instagram viewing pleasure.
Instagram decided to fix something that wasn’t even a problem yet, with its new soundtrack feature. Starting this week, all of its 400 million users will have the ability to add soundtracks to their stories.
Now while building your Instagram story, nestled next to the stickers, you will see a little music note. When tapped, you open a catalog of thousands of songs that can be now added to your story. You can search by specific song, mood or feel, genre, and popularity; then, once the perfect song is selected, you can fast forward or rewind to find that perfect refrain.
Even cooler, if you know what you want before you record your video, you can actually choose your song before recording by selecting the music tab under the recording button. When the Instagram stories are played back, the songs can be heard in the story as well as auto-generating the song title and artist name to be displayed.
As someone who almost exclusively uses Instagram stories for pictures and videos of my dog, this song feature might be what I finally need to be lured away from Snapchat. For the record, these are not just royalty-free, instrumental tracks; Facebook made an agreement with record labels, so we will have access to all of the most current tunes.
"We know that music can play an important role in how you share your moments and express yourself with friends and we’re working hard to bring it to the global community in the future," states the Instagram Info Center website.
This isn’t even the only crazy amazing feature that Instagram has recently released. When you now look at your home feed, you may notice that there is a new television looking icon that lives next to your direct messages.
If there was one area that both Snapchat and Instagram had yet to venture, it was long-form story videos, similar to Facebook Live. IGTV now allows you to upload videos from 15 seconds long up to a whopping 10 minutes in length to live on your own “channel".
This completely changes the game, especially for content creators, who can post videos up to an hour if they have a verified account and they are uploading from a computer.
You might have also noticed a new pop-up after mindlessly scrolling for a little while that says, in what I imagine to be a chipper voice, “You’re All Caught Up". This small but mighty feature relieves the FOMO in us all by informing us when we have viewed all new posts from the past 48 hours. Now, you never have to worry about the elusive algorithm keeping your favorite people off your home feed!
I don’t know about you, but I am living for all of these updates. It proves to me that Instagram is listening to its users and making positive updates that will enhance the user experience for the long haul. Keep it coming!
Feature image credit: Buffer.com
