Instagram

Instagram’s Hyperlapse app picks up native iPhone 6 support, new ‘selfielapse’ feature

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 25, 2014

Instagram’s iPhone app for high quality Time-lapse video capture, Hyperlapse, debuted a month ago.

On Thursday, the software received its first update as developers released version 1.1 which has added native display support for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus phones.

In addition, there's a new 'selfielapse' mode which uses the front-facing FaceTime camera to create cool Time-lapses.

This edition of Hyperlapse includes bug fixes and reliability improvements as well. The app is available free of charge in the App Store.

Instagram is down, it’s not just you! [update: it’s back]

Cody Lee ∙ Updated February 11, 2016

If you've noticed that Instagram isn't working properly this afternoon, it's not just you. Several users have taken to Twitter to complain that the popular image-sharing service is down, and a few of us here at iDB have confirmed the outage.

While parts of the app are still working for some folks, it seems that the Explore tab isn't loading for most users, and many are having issues getting their personal feeds to load. We're also seeing '503 Service Unavailable' in the News tab.

Instagram launches Hyperlapse, a smart time-lapse video app

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 26, 2014

If you're looking for a clever use of the iPhone's gyroscope and accelerometer sensors, look no further than Hyperlapse, a new iOS app by Facebook-owned Instagram which lets you create panning and time-lapse shots, steadycam-style.

The time-lapse feature is similar to one Apple will bring to iOS devices with the release of iOS 8 in Fall.

As for the tracking shots, the software uses advanced algorithms and your iPhone's hardware to smooth out panning shots as if you recorded video with a Steadicam or a professional $15,000 tracking rig.

And in what prove to be a killer feature for folks who loathe Instagram, Hyperlapse can be enjoyed without an Instagram or Facebook account as no signup is required to use the app.

Hyperlapse is available free in the App Store.

How to view the exact timestamp of a photo or video in Instagram

Alihassan Mahdi ∙ August 16, 2014

Instagram is one of the most popular social network and photo/video sharing app available for iOS. If you've used Instagram at some point, you'll know that it doesn't show you the exact timestamp when an image or a video was posted. You will only get a preview of the less informative timestamp, which only displays the time passed since an image or a video was posted. InstaRealDate is a new jailbreak tweak that gets rid of this issue.

InstaRealDate displays the exact and more informative timestamp of a media including the date (day, month & year) and time that it was posted. To view the more informative timestamp, you have to tap on the time located in the top right corner of every image/video and it displays the exact time and date that it was shared such as "8/16/14, 12:30 PM"...

Check out Bolt, Instagram’s Snapchat competitor

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 4, 2018

In case you missed it last week, Facebook-owned Instagram is hatching out a new mobile app to take on the likes of Snapchat, Taptalk and a growing list of other ephemeral messaging apps out there.

Several people have spotted a banner advertising the app in Instagram’s Android app. Billed as a “one-tap photo messaging” solution, they're calling it Bolt.

I have good news and bad news. The good news is, the app's just stealthily launched on the App Store. But, alas, Bolt is only available in New Zealand, Singapore and South Africa for the time being.

And this is how Bolt looks like...

Instagram prematurely leaks its Snapchat rival

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated December 2, 2016

Facebook-owned Instagram may have unintentionally (or intentionally, perhaps?) leaked an image advertising its rumored Snapchat competitor, indicating the official launch could as well be around the corner. A banner for an app called Bolt was spotted by several online users in Instagram's Android app.

Tapping the banner would yield a dead end in the Google Play Store. Although the banner went away a few minutes later, people have already screenshoted it and the image is now making rounds on Twitter and other social media channels online...

Your Instagram photos aren’t where they used to be

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 27, 2014

Facebook-owned Instagram, which in March surpassed 200 million active users and 20 billion photos, used to store user-shared snaps and videos on Amazon's EC2 cloud computing service since 2010, but not anymore.

It's now come to light that the social networking behemoth back in Spring stealthily moved all your photos from Amazon into its own data center, and no one even noticed.

They even coined a term for it: Instagration...

Instagram 6.0 rolls out with 10 new photo editing tools and other features

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 3, 2014

iPhone photography buffs, pay notice: Facebook-owned Instagram is rolling out a major version 6.0 update to its mobile apps. Available free in the App Store, Instagram's iPhone app now comes with ten new tools making photo editing before posting a lot easier.

There are also other features in this update, including more efficient video sharing, an improved design and bug fixes. Jump past the fold for details...

The best Instagram apps for iPad

Joe Rossignol ∙ Updated April 17, 2018

Instagram is one of the most popular social networks for sharing photos and short videos, with official apps available for iPhone, Windows Phone and Android smartphones. But one device that still lacks a native Instagram app is the iPad, as the Facebook-owned company has yet to update the iPhone version to have universal support for the Apple tablet lineup.

As you might expect, a number of iOS developers have taken advantage of this shortcoming by releasing their own third-party Instagram apps for iPad on the App Store. In an effort to save you the trouble of looking through the storefront yourself for these apps, read ahead for a roundup of four of the best Instagram apps for iPad…

Instagram update removes option to share likes and activity to Facebook

Cody Lee ∙ May 16, 2014

Instagram updated its iOS client last night, bringing the app to version 5.0.11. The update is small—the change log only mentions one alteration—but significant, as it takes away the auto-sharing of activity to Facebook.

More specifically, users will now only be able to share images deliberately to Facebook using the in-app share button. So the change should go a long way in decluttering News Feeds, a common complaint amongst users...

Instagram and Facebook stepping up fight against spammers

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 16, 2014

Facebook-owned Instagram has responded to complaints from users who have noticed a sharp increase in the number of fake accounts and followers that are spamming them. If you fire up Instagram's free iPhone app and hit the Following button, you'll see a message about changes in followers.

"We've removed deactivated and spam accounts," the message reads. "Your list of followers and people you follow may have changed" as a result.

This is a welcomed albeit way overdue change.

I've been a frequent victim of spammers on Instagram. Some of these guys are really smart in how they get on your Following list with the ultimate goal of populating your feed with spammy posts often disguised as so-called viral images and videos...

Instagram reportedly testing location integration with Facebook Places

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 30, 2016

Facebook-owned Instagram has traditionally relied on Foursquare for its vast database of points of interest.

For example, upon uploading a photograph Instagram gives you an option of choosing a location where the image was taken using its Foursquare integration, simply by tapping a 'Name This Location' button.

Post acquisition, however, things have become a little weird.

Facebook has long been maintaining its own location database, Facebook Places. Two years into the acquisition, Instagram has now started using Facebook Places as its mapping service, at least for a subset of its users.

Despite this (expected) change, more than the 150 million Instagram fans can continue to share their check-ins to Foursquare from Instagram...