Meet Instagram's new Twitter competitor

Washington, May 22

If reports are to be believed, the first glimpse of Instagram’s rumoured text-based Twitter competitor surfaced in a leaked marketing clip.

The slide doesn’t give the app a separate name — instead, it just calls it “Instagram’s new text-based app for conversations” — but the app is apparently codenamed P92 or, alternately, Barcelona, according to Haberman, quoted The Verge.

Users will be able to sign in with their Instagram username and password, and your followers, handle, bio, and verification will transfer over from the main app.

In the app, the users will see a feed, and they can make text posts up to 500 characters long with attached links, photos, and videos.

The app looks pretty much like if you mixed Instagram and Twitter together, based on two screenshots included in the leaked marketing slide. And Meta will apparently have some good moderation controls from the start, “equipping you with settings to control who can reply to you and mention your account,” the slide says. Any accounts the users have blocked on Instagram will apparently carry over, reported Verge.

The new Instagram text app will have an element of decentralisation as well.

“Soon, our app will be compatible with certain other apps like Mastodon,” Instagram’s slide says. “Users on these other apps will be able to search for, follow and interact with your profile and content if you’re public, or if you’re private and approve them as followers.” (Presumably that compatibility will come through ActivityPub, which Meta has been exploring alongside other tech companies.)

If the app is released widely, it could make Instagram an even more popular destination than it already is. With the continued worsening of Twitter, many people are looking for their next place to share tweet-like updates, reported Verge.