Instagram started testing another great feature that gives users an alternative to finstas. It’s known as the “flipside” and it helps to create a secondary photo grid that only specific friends can see.
Is it a good feature? Instagram makes it easy for users to create posts for a limited audience. This app is added for users to share grid posts with “close friends” like Stories for close friends has been a thing since 2018. Recently it tested out audience lists for stories so that the users can easily create multiple lists for group sharing.
Flipside offers the other way of doing the same thing. Users can create a separate list of friends, different from “close friends,” to add to their “flipside.” They have the option to choose to post to their main grid or to their “flipside,” which is easily accessible from their profile but only visible to the specific list of friends that they want. Users will know if they have access to someone’s flipside if they see a key icon in someone’s post grid, according to the screenshots shared on video Threads.
The Instagram head Adam Mosseri realises this is all a bit unneeded. “On one hand it feels an awesome feature to create a clear space that makes you feel more private,” he wrote in a post on Threads. “On the other, it’s yet another way to reach a limited audience on top of secondary accounts and Close Friends.”
He also said “We’re not even sure we’ll launch it,” which might be a sign why the company has been relatively quiet about the test. Flipside was first started back in December but was a prototype at the time, according to TechCrunch. However, it’s now initially started to appear for actual users, with many reports of it appearing on Threads over the last day.