It wouldn’t be social media if there wasn’t a new update or launch at least 5 times a week, would it? In the spirit of Christmas, we’ve had a couple of gifts from our favourite platforms, some much more well received than others.
Let’s dive into the five biggest social media updates in December, shall we?
Testing the Waters on Instagram
Say goodbye to posting anxiety – Instagram has just launched Trial Reels, a brand-new update designed to help creators be more creative and maximise their reach.
Now, you can share your Reel with a small sample of non-followers first to see how it performs before sharing it with your followers. The move comes after Instagram noticed that some creators get nervous about posting too much or trying something that’s different to what they normally post.
After 24 hours, you can see key metrics such as views, likes, comments, shares and even comparisons with previous trials. If it flopped, your followers will be none the wiser, but if it performed well, you can proudly hit “share with everyone”.
TikTok’s Watermark Chaos
TikTok woke up and chose violence with their latest update. Now, if you want to save a draft TikTok to your camera roll, it’ll come stamped with a watermark. The only way around it? Post the video first and then save it – a frustrating move for social media managers and creators who need to share drafts with clients or brands.
Naturally, TikTok users took to TikTok (because where else?) to share sneaky workarounds. Word on the street is if you start posting a video, hit save, and cancel the upload right before it hits 100%, you might just dodge the watermark (but you didn’t hear it from us).
The backlash has been loud and clear, so it’ll be interesting to see if TikTok hits undo on this update – or at least gives us a hint about why they made the change.
LinkedIn Goes All-In on Video
2024 was LinkedIn’s breakout year for video, and they’re not slowing down. After rolling out ‘Videos for You’ suggestions in the summer, the B2B app is now testing larger video panels in users’ main feeds. These pop up between regular posts, making sure video content doesn’t get lost in the scroll and guiding users toward LinkedIn’s TikTok-style video feed – a feature that’s seen a 36% surge in usage this year.
It’s clear LinkedIn is all-in on video, and we’re already watching for what’s next in 2025.
Collage Your Way
In what feels like Instagram’s millionth update of the year, they’ve dropped a shiny new Collage option for Stories.
This update lets you pick multiple images from your camera roll and piece them together in a collage that actually looks like you made it. Unlike the old-school Layout option, which locks you into rigid templates, this new feature gives you more creative freedom – you can drag, drop and rearrange images however you want.
Just in time for a 2024 round-up collage.
Don’t sleep on Threads
Threads recently announced it has reached a whopping 300 million monthly active users, adding more than 200 million additional users this year.
The X-competitor has seen strong growth in recent months, with controversy around Elon Musk driving some X users over to Threads. So much so, that Threads was the most downloaded iOS app in November.
For the first time ever, Threads also revealed its daily active users: 100 million. While it’s still trailing X’s 250 million, some say it could’ve caught up if it weren’t for the buzz around new player BlueSky stealing a bit of the spotlight.
To keep the momentum going, Threads has been rolling out updates left and right, from new link previews to fun reaction icons. One thing’s for sure: the X vs. Threads battle is heating up for 2025. We’ll grab the popcorn…
