INSTAGRAM shocked fans last night when it removed the ability for many users to see likes.
The social media platform has now admitted this was an accident and had to quickly fix it.
Instagram users in the UK and US spotted they’d lost the ability to see how many likes their posts and the posts of others had got.
Each post would just show one user that had liked it alongside the phrase “and others”.
You could then click on this to see which other accounts had liked a post but if you wanted to know an exact figure you’d have to count them manually.
Instagram tweeted: “We’ve been testing a new experience to hide likes on Feed posts.
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“We unintentionally added more people to the test today, which was a bug — we’re fixing this issue and restoring like counts to those people as soon as possible.”
It added: “This issue has now been fixed. Pull down to refresh your feed and your likes should restore – thanks for your patience!”
Although feeds should be back to normal now, some users actually received a notification that warned them of the change.
It said: “Testing a Change to How you See Likes. We want your followers to focus on what you share, not how many likes your posts get.
“During this test, only you will be able to see the total number of likes on your posts.”
Despite claiming that the mass rollout of hidden likes was due to a bug, Facebook-owned Instagram did actually reveal plans to test hiding likes in 2019.
During a conference it explained it would trial removing likes and video views from feeds so people focused more on sharing content and less on likes.
It also discussed how this could help prevent bullying and other toxic issues on the platform.
The test has previously been trialled in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan and New Zealand.
It’s unclear if Instagram is considering making the feature more permanent.
A lot of people tweeted to demand their likes back but there were some users who welcomed the change and felt less pressure.
One Instagram user tweeted: “Instagram getting rid of likes is actually kind of awesome.
“So many people are addicted to how many “likes” they can get instead of posting what truly makes them happy. I personally love it.”
The tweet has received almost 2,000 likes.
Instagram – the key facts
Here’s what you need to know…
- Instagram is a social network for sharing photos and videos
- It was created back in October 2010 as an iPhone-exclusive app
- A separate version for Android devices was released 18 months later
- The app rose to popularity thanks to its filters system, which lets you quickly edit your photos with cool effects
- When it first launched, users could only post square 1:1 ratio images, but that rule was changed in 2015
- In 2012, Facebook bought Instagram for $1billion in cash and stock
- In 2018, some analysts believe the app is worth closer to $100billion
- In October 2015, Instagram confirmed that more than 40billion photos had been uploaded to the app
- And in 2018, Instagram revealed that more than a billion people were using the app every month
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Did you lose your ability to see Instagram likes? Let us know in the comments…
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This post first appeared on Thesun.co.uk
