In a Broadcast Channels chat with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg this morning, Instagram chief Adam Mosseri announced that you can now post GIFs in Instagram comments.
You can now search for and share GIPHY GIFs in the comment stream, giving you another opportunity to reply to Instagram posts as seen in these examples. It seems like it should have existed for a long time, despite Mosseri’s comment that is a bit of a “finally” feature.
When you also take into account that Instagram launched the ability to reply to Stories with GIFs back in 2020 and that you can also use GIF stickers within Stories themselves, It seems even more bizarre. So, chatting via GIFs has been a thing in IG for a while.
However, Instagram has also made an effort to keep its comments as simple and text-based as possible, with no linking possibilities or other tools. Just not in comment streams.
But now, whenever you scroll down, it’s likely that you’ll encounter twitching images of reaction GIFs. This might open up new creative possibilities and provide fans with more ways to interact with creators.
Given that most other applications allow GIFs in the comment threads, this is not a significant change. But it’s another thing to think about.
GIFs in Instagram comments are available in the latest version of the app.
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