It should be no surprise that social media platforms are constantly looking to mimic the newest functions and apps that populate today’s digital landscape. Instagram, which historically has looked to Snapchat for platform updates has now turned to TikTok and is working on incorporating its unique and wildly popular video features.

Instagram’s latest innovation comes in the form of Clips, and will allow users to record video segments and piece them together into a single story. Users will also be able to overlay music and adjust the speed and timer of each video clip. As a result, Instagrammers will have increased creative freedom, and won’t need to download additional applications in order to edit their video segments, before uploading to Instagram. By streamlining that process, Instagram is ensuring that their platform becomes a one-stop shop for video editing and sharing.

With TikTok’s popularity steadily rising over the last year (the app claims to have 500 million active users), it seems logical that Instagram would look into stifling its growth by incorporating copycat features to their own platform. They have already done this in the past with Snapchat, which resulted in Instagram’s addition of Stories.

Statistics show that new TikTok users typically abandon the platform within 30 days of downloading, which is an alarming dropout rate. We are curious to see if TikTok creators begin migrating their content to Instagram, a platform where many have an established presence and high reach. 

There is a consistent pattern of social media platforms copying features that are working for their competitors, which creates a rapidly changing digital landscape, quick to adapt and innovate. Video has dethroned the carefully curated still images that used to populate our Instagram feeds, which explains the rush to perfect video editing features. Users are gravitating towards a more candid and personalized social media experience, which is now best embodied by TikTok. By adding video editing features, Instagram is ensuring that its users can continue to express themselves in a fresh and spontaneous way, while staying on a platform that has a significantly lower dropout rate than TikTok. 

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