Recently, Facebook Messenger is releasing a slew of new features, the most notable of which being cross-app group chats. The firm debuted cross-app texting between Messenger and Instagram last year, but users will now be able to start group chats with their Instagram and Messenger connections.
- Features: Recently Facebook’s highly successful Messenger chat app gets a slew of new features. The most intriguing new feature is the ability to organize cross-app group chats between and Messenger, both of which are owned by Facebook.
- Polls: Polls in Instagram DMs have also been added today, building on the poll feature that already exists in Messenger. In addition, regardless of which app you’re speaking on, Messenger is adding a group typing functionality to group DMs to enable users to notice when their pals are typing at the same moment. Users will also be able to use Messenger’s current Watch Together functionality to view Instagram posts like Reels and IGTV videos at the same time, as Instagram embraces video content.
- Effects: These announcements come only hours before the business is scheduled to testify before the Senate about the negative effects of Instagram and Facebook on mental health. However, these additions are related to a separate federal investigation into Facebook’s operations. The Federal Trade Commission has filed a complaint against Facebook, arguing that it is a monopoly that needs to be split up.
- Reliant: As individual Facebook products become increasingly reliant on one another, the firm may be able to argue that these apps are inextricably linked and cannot be separated. A Facebook spokeswoman told TechCrunch last month, as Facebook Messenger celebrated its tenth anniversary, that the firm saw Messenger as “connective tissue regardless of the surface.”
- Improvements: Messenger tossed in a few fun ones for those of us who enjoy personalization and are afraid about Mercury retrograde, aside from improvements that better link Facebook and Instagram. A cottagecore conversation theme is now available, as well as an astrology-themed chat theme, stickers, and Instagram AR filters.
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