Instagram is one of the most popular social platforms in the world, but it has long missed a UI for tablets and other large displays. That is finally changing…
Instagram for Android, which has been rolling out over the past few weeks, features a new UI for larger screens that is optimized to take advantage of the additional screen real estate on foldable devices and tablets.
The new layout keeps Stories at the top of the UI and extends the feed to both sides of the display. At the same time, the reels maintain a fixed aspect ratio with black bars for padding. The main change is that the app now features a side-mounted navigation rail. Instagram normally shows buttons on the bottom bar for Home, Search, New Post, Reels, and Profile, but the new sidebar UI adds Notifications and DMs to that list.
The new look feels much better on the Galaxy Z Fold 5 (and the rest of the Fold series), but it's rolling out very slowly.
This update appeared first It will be released within days of Samsung's Fold 5 announcement, but it appears to be rolling out on an account-by-account basis. I tested two accounts, only one showed the UI, and when I switched to the other account, the UI was removed. This new UI also appears to be exclusive to the Galaxy Z Fold series, as it doesn't appear on Google's Pixel Fold or anything else. Fortunately, this doesn't seem to be exclusive to the Fold 5.
Updated 9/1: It has since been confirmed that this layout is not limited to foldable devices made by Samsung, as previously thought. In fact, it even works on Google's Pixel tablet when you use the tablet in portrait mode. When you use your tablet in landscape mode, the app appears in a regular layout with lots of letterboxing, but when you rotate it, you see the tablet UI.
I hope Instagram continues to work on this layout to improve widescreen support. At the moment, the availability of the UI still seems to be very limited, and despite working on Google's tablet, I can't trigger it on the Pixel Fold.
Google has been pushing for more support for larger screens with the rise of foldable tablets and the resurgence of Android tablets, and it's great to see Instagram jumping on board. And given Apple's continued calls for an iPad-optimized interface for Instagram on its tablets, it's quite ironic that it's the first to bring this optimization to his Android. This UI seems very suitable for tablets, but it's unclear if Instagram will make it happen.
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