Popular photo sharing website Instagram accidentally changed how scrolling through posts works on its mobile app, and some people are extremely upset.
First rolled out on Thursday, December 27, Instagram were testing a horizontal image feed instead of a vertical one on the app’s home screen.
Instead of scrolling up and down to view new posts, users instead scroll from right to left, or can tap on the right hand side of the screen to move to the next post, like they would if they were using an Instagram story.
This meant it was no longer possible to quickly scroll through new posts, as each individual post must be swiped or tapped to move to the next. This change only affected the main page, and user profiles worked the same way they did previously.
INSTAGRAM JUST TURNED SIDEWAYS WTF?! pic.twitter.com/cDAUUfa9UF
— TmarTn (@TmarTn) December 27, 2018
While some Instagram users liked this new update, others were extremely unhappy with the change, immediately calling for Instagram to revert to the standard vertical orientation, with some going as far as to say the update will kill the app.
Instagram owes all of us an apology.
— zellie (@zellieimani) December 27, 2018
#instagramupdateMe after i did the Instagram update pic.twitter.com/ZqWFVkPGVs
— UltraInstinct (@shanuddin8888) December 27, 2018
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Opening up Instagram like… pic.twitter.com/PoDkHC9okq
— Atlanta Falcons (@AtlantaFalcons) December 27, 2018
While users have been shocked by this update, the horizontal feed has been in the works for some time, with Instagram originally rolling it out to a select number of users in October.
The new feed went live on Thursday morning, however it wasn’t intended to go live for everyone, with Head of Instagram Adam Mosseri tweeting that it “was supposed to be a very small test but we went broader than we anticipated.”
Mosseri confirmed that the update should be cleared for everyone, and to just restart your app if you were still seeing it.
Sorry about that, this was supposed to be a very small test but we went broader than we anticipated. :grimacing:
— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) December 27, 2018
Instagram went on to state that the update was released due to a bug, and apologised for any confusion caused.
Due to a bug, some users saw a change to the way their feed appears today. We quickly fixed the issue and feed is back to normal. We apologize for any confusion.
— Instagram (@instagram) December 27, 2018
Given the extremely negative response that the updated received from its users, Instagram may think twice about releasing the update to the public. Earlier in 2018, Snapchat released an incredibly unpopular redesign update to their app. The reaction to this change was so bad that Snap, the company that owns Snapchat, saw their stock price drop by $1.3 billion.
