10 Handy Tricks on Insta Stories
I didn't want to, I thought it was nonsense, I also didn't want Snapchat and therefore also no Stories, and now I love it. Let's just say I'm good at being very grumpy at first, only to come around later.
Meanwhile, more than 200 million people use Insta Stories and Snapchat is catching up hard. It remains a handy tool, although many features remain hidden until you read somewhere how it works. And that's why I dove into the world of Insta Stories. I am now a hardcore pro and I'm going to make you one too:
And this is how you're going to do it:
1. Decide for yourself who sees your Stories
Also known as: block others without them knowing. They will still see photos on Instagram, they just won't see that you've used Stories. How do you do that? Tap the three dots in the bottom right of your Stories, click on ‘story settings’ and then on ‘hide story from’. Here you can check names of who can and cannot peek into your day. Handuuuugh.
2. Hide the Stories of, eh, less interesting people
The downside of Stories is that your favorite accounts can get buried in the mass, especially if you follow hundreds of accounts. Want to exclude a few people to keep coming up at the top of your search bar? Hold the dot for a few seconds and you can choose between ‘view profile’ and ‘turn off kikiduren’. Three guesses where you click. By the way, that ‘turn off’ sounds pretty terminator-like.
3. Automatically save photos from your story to your phone
Then go to the three dots in the bottom right, to ‘story settings’ and click on ‘save shared photos’ at the bottom.
4. Set a completely solid background in your Stories
For example, if you want to share a nice quote or write something without fuss. First, take a photo (it doesn't matter what) and then press the pencil icon. Choose a color and then hold your finger down for three seconds somewhere on the screen.
5. Pause photos and go back
Yes, I really had to explain it to my mother this week. So for all newcomers for whom it all goes a bit too fast: hold your finger down to freeze the image. And if you want to go back in a story, you can just tap on the left side of your screen and you'll jump back to the previous photo.
6. A different font for your texts
Because we are a bit done with those standard block letters. Want access to all sorts of creative fonts? Then download the app Emoji Keyboard 2. How it works: you paste the text you want to write into a blue box in the app, change the font there, and then you can copy it and paste it into your Insta Stories. A child can do the laundry.
7. Use a different color for your letters than the standard colors
You have a photo with a lilac jacket. And you want lilac letters too, but grrrr, they are not there. So you first chose purple. No longer necessary. Just hold your finger a bit longer on that purple button and suddenly you'll see a palette of colors that you can create yourself. Yasss, baby.
8. Upload photos that are older than 24 hours
I'm secretly assuming you've already discovered this yourself, but if not: you can totally bypass this by taking a screenshot of an old photo. It will then appear in your camera roll to upload for Stories (here's a place for an evil laugh).
9. Upload videos that are older than 24 hours
That can also be done. Just send it to your bestie, she sends it back to you, you save the video and voilà: it appears back in your last 24 hours. Complicated? Yes. Handy? Uh, yes, also.
10. Link to a YouTube video/website/whatever you want through your Stories
This is only possible for business Instagram accounts linked to a Facebook account. If you regularly post videos on, for example, YouTube or are a blogger, it's super handy to link to your own articles via a ‘Swipe Up’. How it works? First, make sure you're using the latest update of Instagram. Then: take a photo and click on the leftmost icon with a paperclip shape at the top right of your screen. Paste your link there and voilà!
