10 Facts About Instagram Story That IG Users Should Know

Last Updated on 2020-02-17 , 6:44 pm

Everyone who uses Instagram knows that the app came out with its almost-identical-to-Snapchat ‘Instagram Story’ function in 2016.

That made a lot of us guilty of jumping over to Instagram stories from Snapchat to post our unfiltered, everyday lives.

I won’t lie – when Instagram stories became a thing, I ditched Snapchat and never looked back.

It’s convenient, one less app means more phone storage, and it also doesn’t mess up your #aesthetic feed.

So here are 10 facts about IG stories that all you IG users might find interesting!

1. Instagram versus Snapchat

This is really quite the ‘batman-versus-superman’ kind of competition.

And I think we are all wondering the same thing right – after Instagram stories became a thing, who fared better?

Snapchat or Instagram?

Well, according to some interesting stats, Instagram stories actually does better than Snapchat.

Insta stories have about 250 million active users as of 2017, while Snapchat only had 166 million.

Also, the number of people viewing Snaps had decreased by 40% since Insta stories came round the block.

Meaning I probably wasn’t the only person who completely jumped over from SC to Insta.

2. More than half of Instagram users use Instagram story.

Did you know that over 60% of Instagram’s 500 million daily active users use Insta story?

That means either viewing or publishing insta stories.

It’s no wonder that they’ve beaten out the competition (Snapchat).

Do you use insta story? Because I’m definitely in that 60%.

3. Insta stories and marketing.

It’s very hard to talk about social media without talking about influencers and the money-making aspect of things.

So with insta stories having such huge traction, you ever wonder what it means for influencers and brands?

If you hadn’t noticed, a lot of influencers are starting to post sponsored ads on their stories these days.

That’s because brands and companies have jumped on the bandwagon of doing more ‘candid’ and #relatable ads through popular influencers to gain more brand awareness and increase engagement.

Considering that people now spend approximately 28 minutes on the app (up by about 7  minutes) with insta stories around, it makes sense to jump on this advertising opportunity.

Did you know that currently, over 1 million advertisers place ads on Insta stories at least once a month?

4. Most popular filters.

Ding, ding, ding!

The most popular face filter on insta story are the puppy ears (was I the only one who saw this coming?).

This is followed by the sleep mask, bunny ears, love with the heart-shaped darts, and koala ears.

Seems like we all want to look like animals on our stories…

5. Most popular stickers.

We can’t talk about the most popular Insta story face filters without also talking about the most popular story stickers.

A lot of us use them, and I’ll admit that my most-used one will be the days of the week.

But, the most popular sticker is actually the Vibrant Location sticker.

This is followed by the digital time sticker, “like” sticker, hashtag sticker, and the weather sticker.

Which one of these stickers do you use the most? 

6. The order of viewers on Instagram story.

If you post on insta story, you’ve probably checked to see who has viewed your story.

Don’t lie, we all do this. 

But have you ever wondered why your viewers appear in a particular order?

Ho, ho, ho…you’re in for quite the treat.

Check your insta story now. Seriously, all of you who are reading this, pause and go check the people who have viewed your insta story.

It has been widely theorised and proven by some Reddit users that the people who view your profile and photos the most without necessarily engaging in the content with ‘likes’, are the people who will appear on the top of that viewer list.

Haha that means people who have stalked your profile the most are going to be ranked the top few on the list of people who have viewed your insta story.

Did you get a shock to find out who your profile stalkers are? Cuz I sure did.

7. Controlling who sees your stories.

Public or private account, did you know that you can control who sees your stories?

Let’s be honest, this is a pretty useful function for all of you wanting to post some questionable things but have family or bosses following you which make things tricky.

For all those who already know this, consider this a reminder and a PSA to all the poor souls that didn’t know this function existed.

It will save you some embarrassment/judgement.

So just go to your story settings and click on ‘Hide story from‘ and select all the Insta profiles you want to hide your stories from.

And just like that, no more slip-ups!

8. People may have screenshots of your story(ies).

So unlike Snapchat, Instagram does not notified you if and when someone took a screenshot any one of your stories.

But as of February this year, Instagram is planning on changing that. It rolled out a test program where some users got notifications whenever someone took a screenshot of their stories.

It hasn’t become a permanent feature yet, but we’re keeping our fingers crossed!

Really would prevent any nasty shocks in the future…imagine a social media birthday post full of your unglam stories…*shudders*

9. Pen colours.

Do you draw random crap on your Insta stories when you’re bored? Or when you want to be extra AF.

But then the pen only has 8 colours so you’re limited in the amount of colours there are in your beautiful digital artwork.

Well, fret not.

The pen actually has more than 8 colours. Did this blow your mind? Cuz it blew mine when I accidentally found this out. 

Just hold down the pen colour you want and a rainbow scale will appear, allowing you to choose whatever shade you want to put up on your story!

Go get colouring. 

10. The ‘Swipe Up’ function.

You’ve probably seen your favourite influencer or Youtuber on Instagram story with that ‘Swipe up to view…’ caption.

And sure enough, you swipe up and the video, or whatever it is they have linked, appears on your browser.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

It’s a pretty convenient function and I’m sure a lot of you have fiddled around with Instagram trying to see how you can turn that function on for you too.

Well, unfortunately, I’m here to be the bearer of bad news. It is confirmed that only verified accounts will have that function.

So if you want to have it, you’re going to have to get your account verified. There’s really no way around this.

And there you go, 10 interesting facts about insta stories. Hopefully, you found out something new!

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