Instagram’s Answer To TikTok Is Here

Today, Instagram is releasing its most significant update since Stories in 2016: Reels, an editing tool that allows users to craft 15-second clips set to music with options to add timed effects, has officially launched in the US. Users can access Reels from the camera in the upper left-hand corner, where you would normally go to film an Instagram Story, and then flipping through to the Reels tab. There, you can search an audio database, upload video clips and splice them together, add text, and play around with the speed or other effects, like greenscreen. If this sounds suspiciously similar to a different very popular social media app, well, yes. Reels is essentially Facebook’s answer to TikTok, just as Instagram Stories were a pretty blatant copy of Snapchat’s own disappearing Story feature. Reels and TikTok are, for the most part, functionally identical, and Instagram is positioning it as such: as a place to hop onto trending memes and dances, to create goofy content, and perhaps, ultimately, to find fame. Read more at Vox.