Instagram Link Previews Finally Return to Twitter

Almost a decade after they disappeared, Instagram previews have returned to Twitter.

Instagram took away the capability to view previews of posts on Twitter following its acquisition by Meta in 2012. Instagram and Twitter both posted about the change Wednesday, which is rolling out across Android, IOS, and web.

In a Twitter post, the company announced that you’ll now be able to share content from Instagram to Twitter and that a preview of your content will actually be available. This includes a preview of the photo in a Twitter Card.

They said it would never happen… Twitter Card previews start rolling out TODAY. 👀

Now, when you share an Instagram link on Twitter a preview of that post will appear. 🙌 pic.twitter.com/XSZRx9dzd1

— Instagram (@instagram) November 3, 2021

Twitter also highlighted the new feature on its Support account, saying: “If you want to share your latest Instagram post on the Twitter timeline too, you’re in luck: Now when you share a link to an IG post in a tweet, it’ll show up as a card with a preview of the photo.”

Until today, sharing an Instagram post to Twitter resulted in a URL with no context or preview as to what it was for. The only way to provide context to what was going on with your Instagram post was to add a photo or add some text into your Twitter post which effectively made it useless to post from Instagram in the first place.

The change follows Facebook’s announcement that it was shutting down its facial recognition system in light of public safety concerns as well as its rebrand under the name Meta.