Instagram’s announced location-sharing feature, having been tested earlier this year, will soon be arriving with a twist that sets it apart from competitors – a strict one-hour limit.

While Snapchat’s Snap Map lets users broadcast their location indefinitely, Instagram’s cautious approach feels deliberately restrained. The one-hour window creates a sense of urgency and transience, while sidestepping the creepier implications of constant location broadcasting.

Meta already offers location sharing in WhatsApp (with a generous eight-hour window), making Instagram’s conservative one-hour limit feel less like a technical constraint and more like a calculated choice. 

Are they testing the waters? Or have they learned something about user preferences that we don’t know yet?

On another note, the gradual global rollout comes packaged with other intimate DM features, like custom nicknames in DMs and new sticker packs.

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