Instagram copies Tik Tok: Here is Reels, what is it and how it works
Zuckerberg is trying to compete with TikTok, and it seems he wants to introduce the possibility of sharing videos on the style of the competing Chinese app on Instagram.
Instagram has launched a new video-editing tool, currently only in Brazil, which copies some of the most successful features on TikTok. It’s called Reels and is already available on iOS and Android, but we still don’t know when it will be rolled out in other countries as well. It seems that the company is trying to probe the initiative’s success possibilities before distributing the news to other parts of the world.
With Reels users can record videos of 15 seconds, change the speed, synchronize them with background music or take audio from other more or less popular videos, in a similar way to TikTok ” Duet ” function. Once the video is completed, the user can share it among the Stories on Instagram, send it in private, or publish it in a new section in the Instagram Explorer tab, called Top Reels.
The goal of these videos is to go viral and reach a large number of people, just like the ones that are published on TikTok. Reels seems to be Instagram’s attempt to compete with a reality that is quickly catching on among the younger ones.
Moreover, it would not be the first attempt for Facebook, given that the company had already tried to compete with TikTok through an app called Lasso. In that case, the attempt was unsuccessful not bringing the desired results.
Instagram has more fruitful precedents in this regard, given that the Stories have had a moderate success with the public despite being taken quite clearly by Snapchat. It is clear that with Reels, Instagram is looking for the same approach: to propose a feature of the competition to erode market share and prevent other phenomena from interrupting the climb to the success of the service.
TikTok is one of the most successful apps among the youngest: it comes from China, has taken hold in the USA (raising some doubts about user safety) and has been doing so in recent months. It captures the attention of young people and the interests of advertisers, even if Facebook has been trying to counter it for some time, and soon Google could join the war with a similar service that could arrive in the near future.
