How to Filter Your IG Feed With Your Following and Favorites
“Best friends” refers to a person's closest friends. They are certain these people will help them in times of need. And they are more than willing to do the same for their best friends. Therefore, people want to keep in touch with their best friends.
Social media networks allow people to know what the people they care about are up to. They can connect with each other through posts, comments, and direct messages. Facebook and Instagram are some examples.
But here's the thing. The longer a person is on Instagram, the more people in their following list and the most likely they have tried to buy Instagram followers at one point or another. That means their feed will be swamped by posts by their favorite celebrities, organizations, brands, and even acquaintances or strangers. Thus, a person may not see posts from their best friends. The most reliable way to ensure they are not missing anything is by visiting their best friends' profile pages. We can all agree that's a little inconvenient.
Instagram has released a solution to this problem: Favorites and Following tabs.
Favorites and Following: What are they?
Before the start of 2022, Instagram head Adam Mosseri posted a video on the platform. He announced what would be things the company would focus on this year. Unsurprisingly, their top priority is videos – they really want to beat TikTok. But aside from that, there are two more things. One is messaging, and the other controls. In this article, we are focusing on the part about controls.
The Instagram head said they want to give users more control over what they see on the platform. They want users to be able to “shape Instagram into the best possible experience.” One way of doing that is by allowing users to see what they care about quickly. And here they are, delivering their promise.
In the blog Mosseri posted on March 23, he announced the Favorites and Following tabs' arrival. He says that a user's feed is a mix of photos and videos from people they follow, recommendations, and more. And Mosseri adds that, over time, they will add more recommendations based on a user's interests.
That will make finding posts from people one cares about a little more complicated. So, Instagram launched Favorites and Following tabs – a new way to “catch up on recent posts from the accounts you follow.”
Following mode allows you to see recent posts from people you follow. The main difference between this mode and the home feed is the lack of recommendations. Everything will be from brands and people you already follow on the platform.
The Favorites mode is as you would expect it would be. It shows you only the photos and videos from your favorite accounts. You can have up to 50 accounts on your Favorites list. It is recommended you reserve that for your best friends, family, and brands you love the most.
Posts from your Favorites will also show up higher in your home feed. There will be a red star icon next to the kebab button on each of their posts. So you would not need to scroll down much to find them. You may not even need to use the Favorites tab since they are all on the top anyways. But, to be sure, we still recommend going there.
Posts will be in chronological order in all modes.
How To Switch Between Modes
Switching between different modes is super easy. But if you don't know where to look, you may never find them. To do this, you must tap the Instagram word on the top-left corner of your screen. There's a drop-down menu hidden there. It will allow you to choose between Favorites and Following modes.
Remember that you lose access to Direct Messages. The post creator is also not on the main page, but you can find it on your profile page.
To exit these modes, simply tap the arrow back button on the top left corner of the screen. That will bring you back to your home feed.
How to Add People to Your Favorites List
Tap the Instagram word at the top left corner of your screen. Then, choose Favorites. You may be surprised to see there are already posts in that tab even though you have not set your list yet. Instagram generates a Favorites list for you based on who you interact with the most on the platform. But do not worry because that list is not final; you can edit it.
Tap the three lines with three stars on the top right corner of your screen to edit your list. Before you do anything, you can check the list of people Instagram has pre-picked for you. See if it matches the list you have in mind. Tap “Remove” on those included accounts you do not want to be on the list. Alternatively, you can tap “Remove All” and start the list from scratch.
Then, check the suggestions and tap the “Add” button next to the accounts you want to see in this tab. Another option is to use Instagram's search bar tool to make finding the right people easier.
Tap “Confirm favorites” when done. If it is not your first time customizing the list, you can tap the arrow back button, and Instagram automatically saves the changes you made.
The Slight Problem
These new modes sure are helpful. You can get rid of recommendations, which are mostly ads. And as Mosseri said, they added more of them. In a small account with less than 100 followers and following, we tested, eight out of the 10 first posts are recommended videos and Reels.
So, users are likely to opt for using these modes. However, they don't stay in place. Exiting and relaunching the Instagram app brings you back to the home feed. So, users need to do extra taps before they can start scrolling.
Hopefully, Instagram will add an option to choose one mode as the default in the future. But the company wants to push Reels to people so much, and recommendations allow them to do that. So don't get your hopes too high.
Date: December 6, 2022 / Categories: Tips, / Author: Rich Drees
