Instagram may have done away with the reverse chronological feed, sadly! But, faced with persistent demand from users to bring back the feature, the photo-sharing platform is now believed to be working on a similar functionality. Called “Latest Posts,” this feature is going to enable users to catch up on the latest content in their Instagram feeds.
First reported by Jane Manchun Wong, who’s well-known for reverse engineering popular apps, a notification to check out the latest posts will appear in a pop-up window over the main feed. Upon tapping the ‘See Posts’ button, you will be taken to a separate feed and unfortunately, it won’t be a full-fledged reverse chronological feed that users have been clamoring for.
Screenshots of Instagram’s ‘Latest Posts’ feature, attached below, show how the pop-up notification and feed will look like. Do note that this feature is under development and is yet to roll out officially, and in the absence of any official confirmation from its parent – Facebook, it isn’t immediately clear as to when it will be made available universally.
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 pointed out by TechCrunch, Facebook ditched the reverse chronological feed in 2016, opting instead, for a software-generated feed based on the users and the content that a particular user has interacted with the most. While the company has since tweaked the feed timeline somewhat to appease angered users, most people still hated the idea and called for the company to revert to the older format.
While users will still not see an option to revert back to the old chronological timeline, the ‘Latest Posts’ feature does give them an option to see the newest uploads in the feed in a timely manner. And if you ask me, it is something that will, no doubt, be welcomed with open arms by most Instagram users. While there’s no word on when this will be rolled out officially around the world, one would hope that it happens sooner rather than later.