Instagram is combining its Snap-like temporary messages with DMs by introducing an update to its Direct inbox.
On April 11th, 2017, the Facebook-owned company said that Direct can make the experience to send messages fast and easy by turning "any conversation into a visual conversation with photos and videos." With Direct, texts and reshares will appear in the same thread with disappearing photos and videos so users can go back and forth seamlessly.
To use the disappearing message feature, users need to tap on the blue camera icon in any message thread, or swipe left from the Feed. Users can then be able to see who viewed the message and who replayed them. Direct will keep track on anyone that takes a screenshot.
Tapping on the arrow will send the message to individual friends or groups of friends.
"Direct is our best friends experience, for just goofing around on the couch and sharing with your best friends," said Instagram's Product Lead for Sharing Robby Stein.
While the feature isn't at all huge, it can certainly make experience better as it cuts down the clutters. Since Instagram is already the hub for sharing pictures, live Stories and direct messages, an improvement to efficiency is always welcome.
Instagram says it introduced this feature to accommodate the huge uptick in traffic to Direct over the last couple of months. Specifically, 75 million more people are using Direct than in November 2016, which is when it introduced disappearing messages.
Direct is available to all iOS and Android users starting Instagram version 10.16.
"Since our last update in November 2016, the number of people using Direct has grown from 300 million to 375 million." We want to make Direct the best place to have fun, visual conversations with your friends."
