On Thursday, Instagram announced a new feature that will allow users to see how many times a video has been viewed. Similar to Facebook, the app is adding view counts to videos over the next few weeks instead of showing how many likes it has received.
After Instagram released its new multiple accounts switching feature, which was requested a lot, it just could not stop there. The company is now beginning to roll out view counts, which will appear below video posts where likes used to normally appear. Users will still be able to see how many likes a video has received, however, they have now to tap the views button to see them.
Instagram is giving priority to views because they think this is a better way to show how the community is interacting with videos. “Views are the most widely expected form of feedback on the video,” Instagram wrote in its announcement. According to the company, a number of time people spend watching videos on Instagram has raised a lot.
Each view will be registered every time a user watches a video for 3 seconds or more, which is the same as what Facebook considers a view. This is the latest step in the Facebook-owned app’s plans to shift marketers’ budgets from TV to mobile, which is of high interest for advertisers.
View counts will be first tested with some users before the company officially rolls out the feature to everyone over the coming weeks.
Source: Instagram