“News: Instagram to Allow Users to Disable Read Receipts”

November 9, 2023

Instagram Users Will Soon Have The Power to Switch Off Read Receipts for Direct Messages

Published: Thu 9 Nov 2023, 4:52 PM

Last updated: Thu 9 Nov 2023, 4:54 PM

The company Meta, which owns Instagram, will be giving its users the option to disable read receipts for direct messages, similar to the blue and gray ticks on WhatsApp, very soon. This feature is now being tested.

With this new feature, users will have the power to control whether the sender knows that their message has been read or not. Once this feature is enabled, the “seen” label will no longer be visible on the chat window, even if the message is read.

Mark Zuckerberg and Adam Mosseri, CEO of Meta and the head of Instagram respectively, have made the announcement of the new feature.

“We heard your feedback and have started testing a new feature that lets you turn read receipts off in your DMs. Soon, people will be able to choose when to let others see when they’ve read their messages,” said Mosseri.

He also included a screenshot showing what the option will look like in the announcement.

In Privacy and Safety settings, users will be able to toggle on or off read receipts under the “Who can see your activity” category.

WhatsApp, which is also owned by Meta, already launched this feature back in 2014. The company is also working on enabling end-to-end encryption by default for Messenger by the end of 2023 and for Instagram DMs soon after.