Instagram may soon bring back the reverse-chronological feed it abandoned in favor of an algorithmic one about four years ago. Discovered by the Hong Kong-based developer Jane Manchun Wong who reverse-engineers apps to unearth unreleased features, the Facebook-owned social network is prototyping a new Latest Posts tab where users will be able to browse the newest posts by the people they follow.
Instagram is working on “Latest Posts” feed for catching up feed posts
This sounds like the chronological feed people are asking for. Similar, but not the same 👀 pic.twitter.com/AUMwlZGtUr
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) February 14, 2020
As per the screenshots shared by Jane, the new update doesn’t replace the algorithmic feed. Instead, it offers a dedicated section for people who wish to view the most recent photos or videos in reverse-chronological order. The option, at least in the testing phases, appears as a pop-up when a user launches the app. When the user taps the See Posts button, they are redirected to the Latest Posts screen.
It’s clear from this design that the Latest Posts feature is still in relatively early stages and far from public release. By no means is it a fully developed reverse-chronological option like the one Instagram’s parent, Facebook, added a few months ago.
The presence of this test comes especially as a surprise since Instagram’s CEO Adam Mosseri confirmed not long ago in one of his regular Q&A sessions that the company isn’t planning to bring the reverse-chronological feed back any time soon.
“No plans to bring back, though I know some of you feel strongly about this one. We find over and over that people miss more of what they care about when Feed is chronological, which kind of defeats the point of Feed,” Mosseri said in a response.
Instagram did try to compensate for the departure of the reverse-chronological order with a “You’re All Caught Up” mark inside the feed that appeared once a user has viewed all the new photos and videos from the past 48 hours.
If Instagram does go ahead and backtracks on what Mosseri said in January, it will be following the footsteps of other social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter that both have succumbed to the public outcry and added back a reverse-chronological feed option.
We’ve reached out to Instagram for confirmation and will update the story once we hear back.
