Instagram has been busy. And when we say busy, we mean the kind of busy where you blink and half a dozen things have changed while you were making a cup of tea.
Some of these updates are useful. Some are shiny and questionable. Let’s get into it.
You Can Finally Reorder Your Carousels
It has only taken the best part of a decade, but Instagram has finally let us reorder images in a carousel after publishing. No more deleting and re-uploading because you put the before photo after the after photo. No more lying awake at 2am knowing slide three was supposed to be slide one.
It is a small thing. It is also enormous.
Scheduling Reels Will Not Hurt You
Adam Mosseri (bigwig at Instagram) has confirmed that scheduling Reels does not tank your reach. It never did, but the myth has been stubbornly persistent. The bonus: if you translate your Reels, scheduling gives Instagram more time to process those translations before your content goes live. Useful if you are reaching audiences across multiple languages.
You can plan ahead without penalty. Sighs of relief all round.
Tap to Pause is Now a Thing
You can now pause a Reel with a single tap instead of holding the screen like you are trying to keep it from escaping. Small change. Big improvement for anyone reviewing fast-moving content or trying to catch text before it disappears.
Google Might Start Serving Your Instagram Profile First
Still in testing, but Google is experimenting with a redesigned knowledge panel that pushes Instagram profiles higher in search results. If someone Googles you, your Instagram profile could be one of the first things they see.
Worth keeping your profile clean and consistent just in case. Let us know if we can lend a hand with that.
Clickable Links in Captions (With a Catch)
Instagram is testing clickable links in post captions for Meta Verified creators (not businesses, just yet). Currently capped at 10 links per month and only visible on mobile. Meta Verified starts at $14.99 a month, so this is not a free lunch.
At 10 links a month, your link in bio tool is not going anywhere. But it is a sign of where things are heading.
The Edits App Is Growing Up
Meta’s video editing app has had a fresh batch of updates: new visual effects, a more visual Ideas tab, and the ability to highlight specific words in captions during playback. The development team is pulling feedback from creators and monitoring social platforms for feature requests, which means this one is moving fast.
If you want more videos for your feed but feel less than savvy with producing videos for social media, let’s chat. Spoiler alert: you don’t need to be Steven Speilberg.
Creator Tools Are Now Open to All Public Accounts
Instagram has opened up scheduling, the insights dashboard, and access to trending audio to all public accounts, not just professional ones. If you manage smaller or newer accounts, this will help.
A few advanced features still sit behind follower thresholds or Professional Mode, but the basics being accessible to everyone is a solid move. Thanks Insta.
Control Over Your Profile Grid
You can now edit post thumbnails directly in your profile grid. This sits alongside Instagram’s recent shift to larger thumbnail images and the broader push toward profile customisation.
For brands, this matters. Your grid is often where people land before they decide whether to follow. Make it look pretty.
Reels Might Become Your Default Homepage
Instagram is testing a design that opens directly into Reels, with a customisable “Your Feeds” hub where users can switch between Following, Friends, Latest, Saved, Favourites, and Suggested. Given that users already spend around half their Instagram time on Reels, this is less of a surprise and more of an inevitability.
Short-form video is the main event. Everything else is the support act.
Instagram is Coming to Your TV
After launching on Amazon Fire TV in December, Instagram is now available on Google TV in the US. Reels on the big screen, organised into topic-based channels. Mostly a US story for now, but worth watching if you’ll pardon the pun.
Which of These Updates Matter for Your Business?
Which of These Updates Matter for Your Business?
Instagram keeps moving, and keeping up with every change is pretty much a full-time job. Luckily, that is our full-time job.
The carousel reorder will save you real time. The scheduling myth finally being put to rest means you can plan your content properly without second-guessing yourself. And the Google knowledge panel change, if it rolls out widely, is a free visibility win that costs you nothing except a tidy profile.
Not sure what to act on and what to ignore? That is where we come in. We have been navigating changes in marketing for over 34 years now, and we are very good at working out what actually moves the needle for businesses like yours.
