Here’s Everything Facebook Announced at Its Developer Conference
Facebook announced a ton of new products today at its F8 developer conference. The company announced major updates across all its four services: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, and VR/AR. Here’s everything you need to know.
- Facebook is getting into dating. The company will soon allow users to create dating profiles on the social network and meet new people through the platform. Your dating profile won’t be displayed to your friends, but you will be able to meet with mutual friends via the platform once it launches later this year.
- Groups on Facebook are getting a major boost with a dedicated Groups tab on the primary navigation bar on Facebook’s mobile apps.
- Third-party platforms will now be able to integrate with Facebook Stories, offering users with rich sharing experiences for sharing something from an external app on Stories. Spotify will be one of the first to support sharing to stories, whereby users will be able to share the song they are currently listening to and it’ll link to the song on Spotify when shared.
- Facebook will let you destroy data shared by websites and apps with the company, and let you completely disable the collection of such data going forward.
- Facebook is once again opening up its platform to third-party apps following the huge Cambridge Analytica controversy.
- Instagram Explore is getting a completely revamped look, based on your relevant topics and interests. Right now, Explore is almost like a jumbled collection of posts from your interests, but the new design will help you explore content by topics.
- Sharing to Stories also coming to Instagram Stories.
- Third-party AR creators will now be able to create AR effects, face filters, and interactive camera experiences for Instagram.
- Video Chat, including group video calls, are coming to Instagram.
- Instagram is taking significant steps towards doubling down on protecting its community against bullying with new filters that hide offensive comments.
Messenger
- Messenger is getting a completely redesigned look, that looks really gorgeous and clean. Facebook announced its plans to remove a lot of the cluttered mess from Messenger earlier, and the new design could be a step towards making Messenger simple again. The new look will also introduce a beautiful new dark theme.
- Third-party AR creators can now build effects for Messenger.
- Facebook’s M assistant is getting translation abilities, starting with English to Spanish.
- WhatsApp Status (stories) has 450 million daily active users. Yep.
- Group Video Calling is coming to WhatsApp.
- Stickers, including stickers from third-parties, are coming to WhatsApp.
AR/VR
- Facebook’s standalone Oculus Go VR headset goes on sale today.
- 3D Photos are coming to Facebook on mobile devices.
- New social experiences: Oculus TV for watching live or on-demand content with your friends, Oculus Rooms for playing board games, watch movies, and more with your friends, and Oculus Venus to watch live social events — all in VR.
Facebook had a ton of other minor announcements at the conference, but as expected, the company didn’t announce its smart speakers — possibly because of the data privacy controversy earlier. Most of the announcements made today aren’t available today either, and they will be made available over the coming months.
Tagged with AR, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, Oculus, VR, WhatsApp