The Facebook News Feed is now easier to navigate and read, thanks to the latest changes by the social networking giant. On Wednesday, the company said that it has made some design tweaks, including in comment style and readability, to make the platform more user-friendly.
Facebook News Feed now more user-friendly
The latest update to the Facebook News Feed includes increased color contrast to make the text clearer, updated icons and reaction buttons, and larger link previews. The shape of the profile picture frame is also changed with an aim to differentiate the person who is posting from those who are commenting on a post.
“We are always working to help people have more lively and expressive conversations on Facebook. Comments have become the way to have conversations about a post with other people,” Facebook said in a blog post. “We have updated our comment style and made it easier to see which comments are direct replies to another person.”
With the changes, it will now be easier for users to see where a link will take them even before they actually click on it, thus making navigation easier. The social networking giant states that the latest changes will not harm Pages’ reach or referral traffic.
It must be noted that these are not major changes to the Facebook News Feed; rather, they are more some subtle changes that you may not notice at all. You can read about all of the changes here.
Instagram is also getting some design tweaks, like a threaded comment wheel to allow users to have conversations in public. Changes to both Facebook and Instagram will be made available to iOS and Android users over the next few weeks, notes TechCrunch.
Other recent changes from Facebook
A few days ago, the company also made available the Trending Topics section (dubbed Trending News) for Android and iPhone users in the U.S. On clicking the dedicated Trending News button placed in the main navigation bar, a user will see the list of stories based on the comments, shares and likes that the stories are getting globally. Choosing any subject will list the stories from different outlets on that subject, including images, videos and posts from prominent pages, notes The Verge.
Facebook claims that it has no control over the stories and outlets that show up, as the list is based on factors like “the engagement around the article on Facebook, the engagement around the publisher overall, and whether other articles are linking to it.” However, it is still not clear how the social networking giant plans to tackle fake news, hoaxes, and misleading stories, something for which it has received wide criticism lately.
The Facebook Camera interface is also getting a few enhancements. For instance, the GIF creation feature, which was in testing so far, is now officially rolling out. The said feature (inspired by Instagram) will allow users to record two-second GIFs and share them via the News Feed or Messenger. Users now also get the ability to begin a live stream directly from the camera interface.
