You can finally, at long last, zoom in on Instagram photos (and videos).
Today we’re bringing ZOOM to Instagram on iOS! Pinch to zoom on photos & videos in feed, on profiles and on Explore pic.twitter.com/j1g4JQozK2
— Instagram (@instagram) August 31, 2016
Revolutionary.
Instagram notes that the feature is coming to iOS today. It uses a simple pinch gesture, as you would expect (although you have to hold the gesture or it snaps back). It works with video as well, and covers content on your feed, profiles and in Explore.
Instagram is finally shaping up as a platform for more serious photographers rather than just social media mavens. Multiple aspect ratios helped you share images as they were meant to be seen, while zoom lets you hone in on the details.
That said, Instagram still won’t let you rotate your phone for landscape images, and now that you can zoom in on photos, it needs a serious upgrade over its maximum resolution of 1080 pixels wide. We have QHD and 4K displays on our smartphones, after all.
Granted, Instagram has always been more about sharing moments than a purely aesthetic or technical appreciation of photography; that’s probably why the company never implemented zoom in the first place. But with cellphone cameras getting ever better and more photographers sharing their professional images on Instagram, it’s a much appreciated change.
As usual, Android users will have to wait a while longer; zoom will arrive for team Google “in the coming weeks.” No word on Windows support though.
In any case, it’s nice to see arguably the most basic of photo browsing features show up in Instagram, six years after it launched. Head on over to the iOS app store to try it out.
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