Instagram Direct

Instagram businesses and creators may be getting a Messenger-like ‘FAQ’ feature

Instagram is developing a new product, Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), that will allow people to start conversations with businesses or creators’ accounts by tapping on a commonly asked questi

Instagram launches Co-Watching of posts during video chat

Now you can scroll Instagram together with friends, turning a typically isolating, passive experience into something more social and active. Today Instagram launched Co-Watching, which lets friends on

Instagram prototypes Snapchat-style disappearing text messages

Instagram is finally preparing to copy Snapchat’s most popular feature, and one of the few it hasn’t already cloned. Instagram has prototyped an unreleased ephemeral text messaging feature

Instagram tests Direct Messaging on web where encryption fails

Instagram will finally let you chat from your web browser, but the launch contradicts Facebook’s plan for end-to-end encryption in all its messaging apps. Today Instagram began testing Direct Me

Instagram launches Threads, a Close Friends chat app with auto-status

What if Instagram could automatically tell your Close Friends you’re 🏠 (home), 🤓 (working), 🚗 (on the move) or 🛋️ (chilling and might want to hang out)? That’s the idea behin

Instagram is killing Direct, its standalone Snapchat clone app, in the next several weeks

As Facebook pushes ahead with its strategy to consolidate more of the backend of its various apps on to a single platform, it’s also doing a little simplifying and housekeeping. In the coming mo

Instagram prototypes video co-watching

The next phase of social media is about hanging out together while apart. Rather than performing on a live stream or engaging with a video chat, Instagram may allow you to chill and watch videos toget

Instagram is now testing a web version of Direct messages

Insta-chat addicts, rejoice. You could soon be trading memes and emojis from your computer. Instagram is internally testing a web version of Instagram Direct messaging that lets people chat without th

Instagram launches walkie-talkie voice messaging

You’d think Facebook would be faster at copying itself. Five years after Facebook Messenger took a cue from WhatsApp and Voxer to launch voice messaging, and four months after TechCrunch reporte

WhatsApp could wreck Snapchat again by copying ephemeral messaging

WhatsApp already ruined Snapchat’s growth once. WhatsApp Status, its clone of Snapchat Stories, now has 450 million daily active users compared to Snapchat’s 188 million. That’s desp

Instagram now lets you 4-way group video chat as you browse

Instagram’s latest assault on Snapchat, FaceTime and Houseparty launches today. TechCrunch scooped back in March that Instagram would launch video calling, and the feature was officially announced 

Now you can make reservations and buy movie tickets on Instagram

Instagram is unveiling new features for businesses that want to use their profiles to message with customers and even facilitate transactions. Even if you’re not a business on Instagram, you mig

Instagram code reveals unreleased voice and video calling

Instagram wants to be your phone, not just your camera. And it wants to be better at it than Snapchat. Files buried in Instagram and the Instagram Direct standalone app’s Android Application Pac

Instagram Direct one-ups Snapchat with replay privacy controls

Messaging is the heart of Snapchat, so after cloning and augmenting Stories, Instagram is hoping to boost intimate usage of Direct with privacy controls not found elsewhere. Now when you send an ephem

Instagram won’t comment on rumored video calling feature

Instagram copied the ‘Snap’ and now it might be going after the ‘chat’. A video calling feature was spotted in a non-public version of Instagram by WhatsApp industry blog WABet

Instagram is testing a standalone app for direct messaging

Instagram has changed a lot since its acquisition by Facebook in 2012. The original premise was so simple. Beautify your photo and share it to your friends in a couple clicks. Like your friends photos

Crunch Report | RetailMeNot Acquired for $630 Million

Trade in that old dusty GoPro for credit toward a new one, Instagram combines ephemeral and permanent messaging and RetailMeNot gets acquired for $630 million. All this on Crunch Report.

Instagram Direct unites ephemeral and permanent messaging for 375M users

After successfully cloning Snapchat Stories, Instagram is looking to one-up its competitor in chat with a reimagining of its sleeping giant of a private messaging feature, Instagram Direct. Rolling ou

Instagram launches disappearing Live video and messages

Instagram is combining the best of Snapchat and Periscope to help you get comfortable on camera. Rather than overlap with Facebook Live and Messenger, Instagram is putting an ephemeral spin on video s

Instagram launches “Stories,” a Snapchatty feature for imperfect sharing

People only post the highlights of their life on Instagram, so today the app adds its own version of “Stories” to poach goofy, off-the-cuff, everyday content from Snapchat. It works exactl
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