Longer videos and new options: Instagram enriches the Reels

Instagram Reels receives updates that bring maximum clip length to 30 seconds, a 10-second timer and improved editing tools.

Instagram Reels (image: Instagram) Instagram has announced new features for its product created to face the growing popularity of its rival TikTok: the Instagram Reels. The micro-videos introduced in August are now expanding, giving users the ability to record clips up to 30 seconds long. Instagram has therefore decided to double the maximum duration of each single clip from 15 to 30 seconds.

Users can then perform video editing operations to compose their own content. The editing tools have been simplified and improved thanks to the feedback that users have provided in these first months of activity on the social network. Subscribers will be able to act on every single clip by cutting and modifying it or, if the shot is not successful, delete and turn it over without having to intervene on the other clips as well.

Reels updates!

🤳 Create a reel up to 30 seconds

⏱ Extend the timer to 10 seconds when recording

🎬 Trim and delete any clip pic.twitter.com/SVdQnmKYdm

- Adam Mosseri 😷 (@mosseri) September 23, 2020



“You've asked for more options to create and modify Reels and we hope this update gives you more ways to enjoy with them. We will continue to listen to feedback and update the experience as we go along, "writes Adam Mosseri, leader of Instagram, in the tweet presenting the updates of the tool.

Among the novelties presented for the Reels, Instagram has decided to bring the countdown timer up to 10 seconds that allows you to start recording a clip. At first the timer was only 3 seconds but now Instagram is giving the possibility to choose a longer time. This way users can better prepare to shoot a new clip on their own. The timer extension was designed specifically for those users who do not get help with registering their Reels and therefore need more time between when they press the record button and when they are in position.

The product had a strong success favored in part by the story that saw TikTok poised between staying and definitively abandoning the US market. Still too many users, however, using the Chinese rival to create the original content, then reloading it on Instagram in the form of Reels.