Instagram threads have rolled out the most requested features of users to date. It's a feature that sends messages directly to people without switching to another app like Instagram. The company said Direct Messages (DMS) will be rolled out to users globally starting Tuesday, along with a new visual element called Highlighter.
The latter emphasizes interesting perspectives and conversations, and the meta starts with trending topics.
At startup, thread DM provides a basic set of features. They support one-on-one chat, preset emoji responses, the ability to report spam, and Mute DMS (like Instagram). Other features such as group messaging, inbox filters, and more advanced message controls will arrive in subsequent releases.
That means today you can't block messaging with followers or each other. You can block it on threads only, and also on Instagram. To control who can message you, you need to choose whether to follow users or not.
At launch, it will be available to users over the age of 18 in most markets where threads are available, except in Japan, Australia, the UK and the EU.
With the addition of DMS, threads are more competitive with other text-first social apps like X and Bluesky, allowing users to engage each other directly or in group chats, as in the case of X.
However, X is working on encrypted direct messaging within X chat, but the threads are not going to pinpoint private messaging capabilities strictly.
Image credits: Meta/Thread
“We don't encrypt DMS,” said Emily Dalton Smith, vice president of the product thread. “It's really about connecting directly and telling people about what's going on right now. I think encryption reduces the core of the experience.”
Instead, she said the DM is intended to build on the communities people have created in public spaces on the thread. This is a completely different network from the parent app, Smith pointed out.
Image credits: Meta/Thread
“One of the most exciting things is seeing people create their own graphs in threads,” she said. “They are building what we think of as a graph of interest that is new to the social graphs underlying their accounts on Instagram.”
Despite being built on Instagram's social graph, more than a third of people who come to threads every day have less than 50% of overlap between Instagram and thread connections, Meta said.
“Instagram is really for creativity, and threads are for perspective,” Smith pointed out.
The company also found users follow a variety of people on Instagram and threads, and engage in a variety of interests and conversations.
With this disconnect between apps increasing, Meta aims to test other ways to use threads without an Instagram account.
For example, I'm testing the ability for users to log in with a Facebook account (Europe) or create thread-only accounts. We're also testing the ability to use threads from the web, even though we're not logged in.
Image credits: Meta/Thread
The thread creator community is also unique. It may include people who are popular creators on other platforms, but some have become creators of the thread itself. One example is David Rush, a passionate fan who built the NBA thread community.
Smith said the thread hopes it makes it easier for users to find such communities and other communities. This is an important part of the app's future roadmap.
On this front, threads first introduced tags (such as hashtags without hash# symbols) to organize their conversations. I then created a topic feed so I could see everything being discussed about the area of interest. Now the focus is on identifying people who are active and top contributors within the community.
The thread hopes to show that more suggested users will follow searches and recommendations over the coming months, Smith said.
Image credits: Meta/Thread
The new highlighting features are also useful here.
Today, this feature highlights trending topics related to the content you are reading while scrolling through your feed, but over time, threads can highlight user perspectives and active conversations you want to dive into, including within a variety of topic feeds.
Currently there are no other plans to monetize threads beyond ads, Smith confirmed.
Instead, Meta focuses on getting the ads right first, but also focuses on getting AI to work in the background, such as trend topic headings and summaries.
That doesn't mean that teams are excluded from falling even further below AI capabilities.
“We're probably thinking about all the ideas,” Smith said. “But we're trying to really build what our community is telling us and prioritize such small and growing apps.”
Please make sure the threads are not small, they are clear. The app has far more 350 million active users per month than newcomers like Bluesky, which has 37 million registered users. However, compared to apps from meta families whose user base counts in billions, threads have a lot to prove to corporate parents.
Prior to its global launch, DMS was tested earlier this month in several markets, including Hong Kong, Thailand, Argentina and Brazil.