Every big tech wants to be TikTok (except the part about potentially banning TikTok in the US). It’s no secret that Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk are extremely envious of TikTok and its ability to attract younger users; there was therefore no shortage of examples that attempted to conquer the same type of audience.
Meta itself has already copied TikTok several times, either with its own vertical video app or with similar functions on Instagram. And now it’s the turn of its social network Facebook, which is getting some love again after Zuckerberg focused in recent years on the metaverse.
Facebook’s latest novelty to combat TikTok is a new media player; something that makes sense, if we take into account that TikTok has triumphed thanks to the format of its videos, designed to be enjoyed on mobile phones, and not so much on large screens like computer screens.
Facebook focuses on videos
So it’s no surprise that Facebook’s new video player is designed for vertical and mobile screens; although it is used in all types of content, both in short Reels videos and in long videos and even in live streaming videos. In fact, one of the goals of the redesign was to create a more consistent experience among all types of video content offered by Facebook.
Thus, the interface of the new player takes into account all the different videos that can be seen on the platform, with a more minimalist design and icons that will be less disturbing when watching. It is by putting it in full screen that the change will be particularly visible, with a new search bar that will allow us to better find the part of the video we want.
New horizontal Facebook video player
Of course, the most striking thing about the new Facebook video player is that will be vertical by default; Additionally, the recommendation system has been improved so that it always shows a relevant video at the end, regardless of the content type. Facebook’s objective is therefore clear, that we always stay on this screen watching videos one after the other, like on TikTok. To encourage this, Facebook also announced that it would show more Reels videos in Facebook app recommendations.
The advantage of Facebook compared to TikTok is that we will always have the full screen horizontal view if we prefer, even if it is not the one that will be used by default; and Facebook does not want to penalize long videos, with buttons that will allow us to move forward or backward 10 seconds to find the part we want, like in the YouTube application.
