Reels, Instagram’s answer and clone to TikTok, (which in turn is a clone of Vine), would not be affected however.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri stated a week ago that Instagram is no longer just for sharing photos, and the company has started shifting into video amid the intense competition between juggernauts TikTok and YouTube. Hence, it started merging two of its most popular features: IGTV and Feed Videos into a single format called “Instagram Video”.
This new feature will be available on the app and can be found immediately upon signing-in. It’s in a new tab called “Videos”
Users can also now easily full screen on the video just by tapping anywhere that is within the video’s boundaries. Similar to Facebook’s algorithm, they can choose to watch the next set of videos or tap the back button to exit video-viewing mode.
The short-form video and YouTube Shorts/TikTok rival “Reels” would not be merged and would remain as a separate feature, according to TechCrunch.
In addition to the new Instagram Videos feature, the company is adding ways to perform light edits directly through it. Apparently, the reason why IGTV was dropped in the main app was because, as a standalone product, it didn’t appeal to users and caused massive confusion to them, in particular, of how redundant it was to the already cluttered main Instagram app. However, this doesn’t mean the standalone app would go away. It would continue to go on as a service, but renamed and rebranded to “Instagram Video” in future updates. Reels aren’t supported there.
Features available for IGTV would remain intact, such as the ability to place ads on videos so content creators can monetise them. Longer videos would show a 60-second footage as a sneak peek (similar to how YouTube does it). These features would remain, but renamed.
It will roll out globally on both iOS and Android at an unspecified date.
Source: TechCrunch, Instagram
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