Instagram Reels Video Length Limit Expanded to 60 Seconds, New Teenage Users Defaulted to Private Accounts

Instagram’s Reels gets a new 60-second video length option added alongside the original 15 and 30 second options.

By Tasneem Akolawala | Updated: 28 July 2021 12:03 IST

Instagram Reels Video Length Limit Expanded to 60 Seconds, New Teenage Users Defaulted to Private Accounts

Instagram will send push notifications to public teenage accounts to make them private

Highlights

Instagram will offer teenagers the option to switch to public account
Instagram Reels rival TikTok recently expanded video length to 3 minutes
Instagram will try to limit options for advertisers to target teenagers

Instagram Reels video length has been increased to 60 seconds, the company has announced. Before this, users could choose between 15-second and 30-second video length limits, but now a new slightly longer time duration has also been made available. In addition, Instagram is also bringing new protections for teenage users by defaulting them into private accounts and making it harder for potentially suspicious accounts to find young people on the platform. It will also send push notifications to current teenage users, urging them to make their accounts private.

The social media platform took to Twitter to announce the expansion of video length for Reels. Moving forward, Instagram users will be able to make up to 60-second Reels. TikTok, the Reels arch-rival, recently expanded its limit to 3 minutes to offer its creators the option to make slightly longer and versatile content without losing the fast-flipping nature of the platform.

Furthermore, Instagram has also announced that it is introducing new protection measures to make teenagers' social media experience safer. It is defaulting new joinees under the age of 16 (18 in some countries) into private accounts. A private account lets only people who follow you see posts, Stories, and Reels. Random users can't even comment on their content and posted content cannot be seen in sections like Explore and hashtag.

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For young people who already have a public account on Instagram, it will show them a notification highlighting the benefits of a private account and explaining how to change their privacy settings. “We'll still give young people the choice to switch to a public account or keep their current account public if they wish,” the company says in a blog.

All of these changes make it harder for potentially suspicious accounts to find young people and limits the options for advertisers to target young people.

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