In August 2016, Instagram launched the Snapchat-esque Stories, ephemeral photos or videos that disappeared off the platform after 24 hours.
Now, however, Instagram users will finally be able to keep their Stories through one of two ways — Highlights or Archives.
Highlights
Highlights are intended to let users select a handful of stories that are particularly noteworthy and feature them prominently on their profile. Highlights will be displayed until you decide to remove them and you can have as many of them displayed as you’d like.
To create a highlight, tap the “New” circle located at the far left of the new section on your profile underneath your bio. You’ll then be able to choose any stories from your archive and give each of them a cover and name.
From then on, your highlight will appear as a circle on your profile that plays as a standalone story from what users will see in their main Instagram feeds. You can tap and hold on a highlight on your profile to edit or remove it entirely.
Archives
Outside of Highlights, stories will also live on through a new Archive system. Once a story expires at the 24 hour mark, it will automatically be saved to your archive for viewing at a later time. Alternatively, these older stories can also be shared once again either as a new story, highlight on your profile or post.
Archived stories can be viewed by tapping the ‘Archive’ icon on your profile and choosing ‘Stories Archive.’ Here, stories will appear in a grid format, with the oldest stories displayed at the top and the most recent ones found at the bottom.
Stories are grouped by days, with the first story from each day featuring a date indicator to help with navigation.
This news follows reports last week that Instagram was testing a number of possible upcoming features, with archiving Stories being one of them.
The new updates are part of Instagram version 25 on Android and iOS.
Earlier this week, Instagram also revealed a new alert system that aims to remind users of the dangers of taking selfies with wild animals.
Source: Instagram
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