Instagram Threads is rolling out users’ most-requested feature to date: the ability to message people directly, without having to switch to another app, like Instagram. The company said direct messages (DMs) will begin rolling out to users globally beginning on Tuesday, alongside a new visual element called highlighter.
The latter will emphasize interesting perspectives and conversations, Meta says, starting with Trending Topics.
At launch, Threads DMs offer a basic set of features. They’ll support one-on-one chats, preset emoji reactions, the ability to report spam, and mute DMs (as on Instagram). Other features, like group messaging, inbox filters, and more advanced message controls, will arrive in a later release.
That means today, you can’t block a follower or mutual from messaging you — you can only block them on Threads, which will also block them on Instagram. To control who can message you, you have to choose whether or not you follow the user.
At launch, DMs will be available for users 18 and up in most markets where Threads is available, except for Japan, Australia, the U.K., and the EU.
With the addition of DMs, Threads becomes more competitive with other text-first social apps like X and Bluesky, where users can engage with one another directly or even in group chats, as in X’s case.
However, while X is working on encrypted direct messages within X Chat, Threads has no intention of tightly securing its private messaging feature.
Image Credits:Meta/Threads
“We’re not encrypting our DMs,” said Emily Dalton Smith, Threads VP of Product. “It’s really about just connecting directly and talking to people about whatever is happening now, which I think makes encryption less core to the experience.”
Instead, she said that DMs are meant to build on the community that people have created in the public space on Threads — a network that’s shaping up to be entirely different from its parent app, Instagram, Smith pointed out.
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