According to Reuters, the social media platform plans to launch a version of the app with a chronological feed early next year. Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri made the announcement during a Congressional hearing on Wednesday, saying the company has been working on the option for months. Lifewire reached out to Instagram to find out more about the chronological feed, such as if it will be an app update or an entirely separate app but has received no response. Right now, your Instagram feed is ranked based on a combination of three factors: the content you’re most likely to be interested in, your relationship with people posting, and the timeliness of the post. This is why you’ll still see posts from a few days ago pop up in the first few posts on your timeline. Instagram switched from a chronological timeline to an algorithm-based one in 2016. In a recent blog post, Mosseri said that the new algorithm method was created because “people were missing 70% of all their posts in Feed, including almost half of posts from their close connections.” The announcement of an upcoming chronological feed option is a surprise, given that Instagram has said in the past that it would not consider bringing back a chronological feed option. It’s also a stark contrast to what was announced earlier this year when Instagram was testing putting suggested posts ahead of posts from people you follow. Adding the feature as a mainstay in your feed would theoretically keep you scrolling instead of exiting the app for lack of content.
