No, you haven't been imagining things: for months now Meta Platforms
"We're making it easier for you to control what content you see and discover on Facebook," Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said during the update announcement on July 21. "We're introducing Feeds, a new tab that lets you easily see the most recent posts from your friends, Pages and groups."
The new Home tab will be included in an update administered over the next few weeks. The feed will feature looping videos, status updates, and posts chosen using Facebook's algorithm based on users' history on the app. This is a move away from Facebook's previous focus on content posted by friends and family.
"You can curate a Favorites list of the friends and Pages you care about most and filter their content in this new tab," the company said. "We're also naming the primary tab - the first thing you see when you open the app - Home. Home is the starting point for connection, entertainment and discovery on Facebook."
Meanwhile, Instagram posted on the same day as the Facebook announcement about its own upcoming changes.
"We're announcing new features to Instagram that make it more fun and easy to collaborate, create and share reels," Instagram wrote in a blog. "We're expanding our tools for Remix to help enhance the way you tell stories on Instagram when collaborating with your favorite creators and friends."
Like Facebook's planned feed, TikTok's platform prioritizes viral videos by promoting its most engaging content to the most users. This means that TikTok is able to keep users on their app whether or not their friends are posting videos, keeping users on the site for longer. TikTok tops the list of social apps that young people use frequently, with kids and teens averaging 90 minutes on the app per day.
While TikTok has exploded in popularity in recent years, Facebook's subscriber growth has stagnated, and Zuckerberg has been feeling the strain. TikTok's growing popularity was the reason behind the introduction of Reels on Facebook and Instagram, which Zuckerberg once again touted during the July 21 announcement.
It's TikTok's style of constant engagement that Facebook and Instagram have been trying to mimic. However, Meta is hardly alone in its transition towards "discovery" style, algorithm-based feeds. Snap
Meta has faced backlash from users in the past for making significant changes to the platform, so Facebook will introduce different sorts of content to users' Home feeds over time, rather than all at once. The first phase involves increasing the amount of short-form video content. The Home feed may also begin to show posts from accounts users aren't following.
However, users will have the choice to opt-out of seeing posts from accounts they don't follow by changing the settings for their feed. CEO Mark Zuckerberg has emphasized the fact that Facebook users will still be able to pick what they see on the platform.
"One of the most requested features for Facebook is to make sure people don't miss friends' posts," Zuckerberg posted on Facebook. "The app will still open to a personalized feed on the Home tab, where our discovery engine will recommend the content we think you'll care most about. But the Feeds tab will give you a way to customize and control your experience further."
