Instagram 12+

I literally live on this app, it’s pretty much the only social media I used regularly. But a distinct issue with instagram is that some updates will just.. make everything wonky or sort of make the app lose its appeal. Even though reels are just straight up an accessible tiktok on the app, I don’t mind them. However, I’m extremely baffled with the recent update that changed the format of instagram videos. It’s like an IGTV/REEL format instead and it makes it very hard to save videos to folders- which in my opinion is one of instagrams BIGGEST appeals. Unlike other social media apps you can very easily sort posts into folders for later references. Making this feature that much more difficult to access is especially annoying when you are a part of the editing community in instagram where you’ll want to save certain edits to certain folders or save audios to an audio folder. If I’m scrolling through my feed it’s fine, but it’s very tedious to save a video if it’s something my friend sent me since I have to go into my account saves and manually move it. Granted, it only takes like 10 seconds, but I really don’t get the point of making it harder when it only took like 3 seconds before.

I downloaded this app years ago in order to connect with friends and family as well as to share my artwork. It started off good, the feed was showing me people and tags I followed, all in order of when they were posted, and people were able to see my own posts no problem.
But, it has gone extremely downhill from there. My feed is taken up by ads and things instagram “thinks” I would like, only every 3-5 post is posted by someone I follow, and it’s NEVER in the order it’s posted in (a post posted 5 days ago will show up before one posted 1 hour ago) and Instagram pushes more posts by the people I follow with a larger following then people without (I NEVER see my moms posts even though she posts all the time, but the cute cat accounts that have thousands of followers fill up my feed).
This app has also severely damaged my mental health, and since recently after I had restricted my usage to 0 hours I have noticed a significant increase in my mental state. This app made me feel horrible about myself, my body, and my life progression and success’. It’s also very addictive, so you get stuck scrolling for hours on end, like an endless pit.
Also, Meta is kinda Meh, in general. Since all that has been going on with Facebook (another Meta application) and it’s issues with leaking user info, I don’t trust it.
If you value your sanity. Don’t download this app. And if you already downloaded it, delete it.

Instagram used to let me see content of accounts that I actually follow, but lately it’s been flooding my feed with random popular accounts that are “related” to my interests but I don’t follow. Some of them don’t even post content relating to my interests. Just completely random. It’s very frustrating that I have to go to the accounts I follow to be up to date with their posts instead of seeing it in my feed in the order they were posted. I understand that it’s handy to have similar content suggested, but what about newer accounts that aren’t quite popular yet that may have content I enjoy? Those get drowned out if they don’t have a billion likes and views. It’s been causing me to use the app less frequently altogether as a result.

I only use Instagram for art. I use the appropriate hashtags, make reels, etc. it doesn’t seem to matter because my content only reaches a small fraction of my followers and practically no one outside my following (it shows in the analytics). Yet when I post the same content on other platforms, they get much more views and reactions than on Instagram. I’ve become more active on other apps because I don’t see the point in using a platform that doesn’t “platform” my posts.

I want to see the people I follow, and I want to be able to discover new and upcoming accounts with similar content. I don’t know why they’ve changed the way the feed works, but I cannot stand it.