Instagram Reimagines 'Friends': Mutually Following Now Counts

Friends … followers … where is the line? Instagram is testing out new tweaks that emphasize friends. It also has a new definition of friends: People who mutually follow each other. The Instagram test involves changing a user's "following" count on a profile to a "friends" count. That means if you follow thousands of people, but maybe only a few hundred of those people follow you back, that'll show up as your "friends" count. For those of you who care about those precious follower-to-following ratios, get ready for a potentially even more telling public ratio: How many of those Instagram followers are friends? Instagram is quietly running this as a "small global test," a Meta spokesperson confirmed to Business Insider, adding that the platform is trying to understand how users respond to seeing more content from friends in the app. "Friends are central to the Instagram experience, so we're exploring ways to make these connections more visible and meaningful," a Meta spokesperson said. "We're running a small test to highlight Friends throughout Instagram." As part of the test, Meta is also labeling some content in the feed as "friends" instead of "posts" or "following." Is Instagram for friends anymore? As influencers, brands, and now AI slop have invaded Instagram's feed, it's felt less and less like a space to share content with your friends. That's part of the reason Instagram has doubled down on its "Close Friends" features over the years, focused on direct messaging (where friends and family often share content), and added more friend-focused features. For instance, Instagram rolled out a feature called "Blend," which lets you and a friend share a mutual feed of reels. Last year, Instagram also introduced features like a social mapping experience similar to Snapchat's map, as well as a "Friends" feed in the reels tab, where you can see content your friends (by Instagram's definition) are engaging with.