Instagram Update Adds Emoji Shortcuts Bar for Faster Comments

[MacRumors]

Instagram has added an emoji shortcut bar to its mobile app that places the user's most-used emojis above the keyboard whenever they start to comment on a post (via The Verge).

The new emoji bar doesn't appear on other occasions in the app that call for the use of the onscreen keyboard, such as when a user creates a post or comments on a Story.

Instagram has obviously identified post comments as the place where emoji are most frequently used on the platform, and naturally wants to make the interaction as easy as possible.

The feature has been in limited testing since May, but only recently became available to everyone on the image-led social network with the latest mobile app update.

That feeling when your favorite emojis are right in front of you 🙌😍 pic.twitter.com/QPF8eGc5yD - Instagram (@instagram) September 6, 2018

The use of emoji in digital communications has skyrocketed ever since Apple introduced the emoji keyboard to iOS back in October 2011. In the month following the introduction, Instagram revealed that 10 percent of text on the social network included the use of emoji.

By March 2015, nearly half of all text on the platform contained the ubiquitous expressive characters, leading Instagram to employ machine learning to recognize long-term emoji trends. This latest update might be regarded as an inevitable outcome of its extensive analysis.

Article Link: Instagram Update Adds Emoji Shortcuts Bar for Faster Comments

 

[alpi123]

It would've been better if these emojis were your most used ones, not the most generic.

 

[nwcs]

It makes sense that they are doing this. I know quite a few people who will enjoy it. I just wish some of these options were settings you could disable. I’d disable this, stories, and their TV thing. At some point it’s just too much distraction, I think, from the reason I’m there: posts.

 

[lellis2k]

Barmoji is a great jailbreak tweak that adds this functionality to the stock iOS keyboard in the completely unused space between emoji icon and mic icon on the iPhoneX. Today I unjailbroke my phone for iOS 12 and already miss it

 

[Futurix]

Odd, I had that for months...

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

Odd, I had that for months...

Facebook and Instagram roll out and test new features slowly, testing them with groups in certain areas before rolling them out more widely. You may often see new features pop up that haven't been pushed to all users.

 

[ignatius345]

It makes sense that they are doing this. I know quite a few people who will enjoy it. I just wish some of these options were settings you could disable. I’d disable this, stories, and their TV thing. At some point it’s just too much distraction, I think, from the reason I’m there: posts.

I have had this crappy emoji feature for a month or so for whatever reason. It’s awful and the emoji it suggests aren’t ones I’ve ever even used before.