Hey, have you checked out your Instagram profile grid lately?
If you have, you may have noticed a change in format, with the thumbnail images for your posts switching to a more vertical-aligned presentation, as opposed to the regular square image display.
That presentation style, which Instagram has been experimenting with for months, is more aligned with Reels, and incidentally, TikTok, which Instagram is trying to set itself up as a replacement for.
And it’s also, according to Instagram chief Adam Mosseri, more suited to how the majority of people now use the app.
As per Mosseri:
“We started with the tall grid because most photos and videos that are uploaded to Instagram at this point are vertical and rectangles do a better job showing off those photos and videos. That said, I know some of you spend a lot of time tweaking your grids and this blew all of that up, so we’re going to improve the ability to customize those thumbnails to make it easier to get back to a place you’re happy with.”
Yes, for all of those people who’ve set up complex grid displays that create a larger image when viewed on a profile, Instagram is working on solutions, albeit makeshift ones that still align with the new update.
Instagram’s also looking to move your Highlights into the grid, while also adding them as a separate tab.
As per Mosseri:
“Highlights are a great way to showcase your favorite stories, but they are visually complicated and push your grid down. In order to maintain creator control we’re building a tool so you can re-order your entire grid and make it whatever you want.”
This has been a long-requested IG feature, in enabling users to re-format their profile grid as they see fit. That’s coming, while Instagram’s also looking to add the ability to post directly to your grid, in case you want to bypass the feed entirely.
So you’ll have more ways to customize your profile display within this new format, though the variance of the new display will remain, and you will have to re-align your presentation around these taller images.
And while many users are less than happy with this update, it is, again, worth noting that Instagram did flag this update in August last year.
So it has been coming for some time, it’s not some new, out of nowhere change that nobody knew about. But it was rolled out to a lot of users very suddenly, as part of IG’s broader effort to position itself as the best alternative to TikTok.
But either way, it’s here now, and it looks like it’s going to stay. The details may change, but given that more content is now uploaded to the app in vertical format, it’s time to re-align your approach around this new profile UI.
Time to get to refreshing your IG profile for the new era.
