Instagram for the iPad is there: Oh, that works?

After years of postponement and confessed, Meta, formerly Facebook, has mercy: Instagram has been officially available for the first time since Wednesday evening in a variant adapted to the iPad. The photo and video network, which in recent years had to fight against the sharper competition of the Chinese service Tikok, can also be used properly on the Apple tablet. Previously, many users had switched to the browser version.

“Someday” is now

Instagram came to Meta in 2012, at that time the iPad had been on the market for about two years. At first there was no separate Facebook app for the Apple tablet, but that had already changed in 2011. In June it was last said that Instagram was “actively tested” on iPads-without specifying a release date. In the spring of 2022 it was said that the iPad had “no priority” for the service, said the head of the meta department, Adam Mosseri. He hoped to be added “at some point”. This “someday” is now.

Instagram for the iPad is regular In Apple’s App Store available. The service is mainly trimmed on short videos-called “Reels” in the Instagram slang: Because, Meta claims, “The exchange of entertaining content is largely based on Reels today”. Instagram has now been “redesigned for larger screens to offer users an optimal entertainment experience”, writes the group.

More space and video focus

So you land directly when opening the application in the reels, not in the photos that Instagram had once made great, but which in turn are missing from Tiktok. Furthermore, you quickly get to the stories, i.e. the combination of videos, photos and interactive elements that disappear again by default. There is also a “followed” that shows the posts of the people whose followers you are. Only those who switch to “latest” (for chronological representation) do not go into the violence of the meta-algorithm. “All” and “friends” are loaded by this. “All” contain content from all accounts that you follow, “friends” only those who also resemble you.

Otherwise there are various known standard functions such as news and notifications that are shown in a double tab layout. That is “even more comfortable in operation,” said Meta. In practice, however, this leaves a lot of white space when Instagram is used in landscape format, as is apparently intended by Meta. Instagram is free. Meta sells a verification for 16.99 euros as an in-app shopping. The controversial way to park the tracking for a lot of money is obviously not yet planned here.