Facebook has taken its biggest step yet in integrating different messaging platforms, allowing specific users on Messenger and Instagram to send messages to another app.
In addition to launching cross-platform messaging (integrating Instagram messages with Messenger), Instagram is also undergoing a major overhaul of its messaging system, which will be expanded with features taken from Messenger.
Instagram’s new messaging tools include disappearing messages, selfie stickers, custom emojis, chat colors, new ways to block spam, and the introduction of the Watch Together feature in Messenger, which lets you watch videos with friends during a video call.
Users can opt out of cross-platform messaging if they wish.
Users will be able to decline the update if they choose, but Facebook will no doubt be betting that access to new features will encourage them to say yes.
In addition to cross-platform messaging, users on Instagram and Messenger can also search for profiles across both apps simultaneously.
Users can opt out of these features if they wish.
However, it is unclear when and where the cross-platform messaging feature will be available on Instagram and Messenger.
According to CNN, the feature is currently “being tested in select markets and will expand globally in the coming months.” There’s no general timeline on when Facebook might also start integrating its other messaging giant, WhatsApp.
The news is part of an ambitious plan outlined by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in 2019 to transition his social media empire from one founded publicly to one focused more on private communications.
As Zuckerberg explained in 2019, “Private messaging, ephemeral stories, and small groups are by far the fastest-growing areas of online communication.” By integrating messaging into its various applications, each of which has more than a billion users, Facebook hopes to capture as much of this market as possible.
Previous steps have included launching an app for small businesses that lets them manage pages and profiles across Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram, and a new Account Center tool that lets anyone control their login information on various Facebook properties.
Combining these services represents a major infrastructure challenge, especially for the upcoming integration of WhatsApp, which is end-to-end encrypted.
But a bigger hurdle may come from regulators, who are wary of Facebook’s dominance in mobile messaging.
After Zuckerberg announced his ambition to merge messaging on Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger in 2019, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes called on the company to break up the partnership.
Hughes argued that Facebook has become a social media monopoly, with users unable to turn to any viable competitor.
A number of prominent US politicians, including current Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, have echoed these concerns.
Facebook is also currently under antitrust investigations in both the US and the European Union, with Zuckerberg testifying before the FTC just last month.
