IGTV was built according to how people use their phone: vertical and full screen. It is simple, intuitive as it starts playing as you open the app and allows you to multitask. Guess what, the platform was only supporting vertical videos. The mobile-first company recently declared that the IGTV will now support landscape video. During the launch of IGTV, the vertical mode was the main usp. The change comes because of the feedback by creators who use the platform daily. Vertical video formats were found to cause inconvenience of the viewers.
“We realize this is an evolution from where IGTV started — we believe it’s the right change for viewers and creators,” the company states in a blog post. “In many ways, opening IGTV to more than just vertical videos is similar to when we opened Instagram to more than just square photos in 2015. It enabled creativity to flourish and engagement to rise — and we believe the same will happen again with IGTV.”
IGTV has grown a lot in this 1 year. The change that they have bought is from a user experience point of view. They listened to the creators and viewers and made the change for an improved experience. This includes an important change Instagram made this year which enables creators to publish the preview of IGTV videos to their Insta feed. This becomes another way to attract more viewers and increase the viewership ratio.
IGTV has struggled in the video industry as compared to Tiktok and youtube which is leading the space. Unlike youtube, in Instagram creators are unable to monetize their content yet. Brands haven’t yet started paying to the creators for the creation of IGTV videos. Another struggle of IGTV was to create videos with vertical optimization. The creators who published on youtube, for them to move on to IGTV meant creating a separate cut for their content or filming in a different way to make video display appropriate. As the viewers were less than what the creators expected, Instagram updated with a new feature of landscape video.
So this marks a victory for IGTV creators who can now create greater content especially dance and sports videos as they need a wider frame to fit more people. This will give the viewers to watch even more content from the creators they love and that too straight from their phones.
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