Instagram introduces ‘quiet mode’ to help users take breaks

Instagram, a Meta-owned social media platform, has introduced a new feature that will allow users to take a break and focus on other aspects of their lives other than social media.

Instagram claims that the feature will also encourage users to set boundaries with their friends and followers.

While the feature is available to all users, Instagram stated that it is especially aimed at teen users of the platform.

Users will not receive notifications once the feature is enabled, and their profile’s activity status will change to notify others. When such users receive a direct message, Instagram will automatically send an auto-reply. Instagram made the following statement:

• “Teens have told us that they sometimes want to take time for themselves and might be looking for more ways to focus at night, while studying, and during school. You can easily customize your Quiet mode hours to fit your schedule and once the feature is turned off, we’ll show you a quick summary of notifications so you can catch up on what you missed.
• “Anyone can use Quiet mode, but we’ll prompt teens to do so when they spend a specific amount of time on Instagram late at night. Quiet mode is available to everyone in the US, United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand starting today, and we hope to bring it to more countries soon,” it added.

In addition to providing teens with more ways to manage their time and experiences on Instagram, Instagram said it also wants to help parents to be more aware of the choices their teens make, and make it easier for them to have discussions with their teens about their settings through Family Center and supervision tools.

• “Recently, we added the ability for parents to see their teen’s Instagram settings, including privacy and account settings. If their teen updates a setting, parents will receive a notification so they can talk to their teen about the change. Parents can now also view accounts their teen has blocked,” it said.