Earlier this week, Facebook announced it would start an experiment within Instagram, hiding ‘like’ counts from followers, starting first in Canada.
As of today, this new ‘like’ count disappearing act has started to roll out. A notification within Instagram says they are ‘Testing a Change to How You See Likes’, which goes on to explain:
“We want your followers to focus on what you share, not how many likes your posts get. During this test, only you will be able to see the total number of likes on your posts.”
Normally on your posts, you’ll see it’s ‘liked’ by one person and how many others liked it. But after this update, that number now just reads, ‘others’. Check out the example below:
Once you tap ‘others’, Instagram then shows you how many ‘likes’ your post received, showing a list of people.
Again, by hiding ‘like’ counts from followers, it aims to increase the quality of images shared and also discourage image-baiting posts from spammers and more.
Let us know if you’re seeing the ‘like’ count disappear from your Instagram account in Canada.
