The unstoppable rise of TikTok in recent years has caused its main rival, instagram, has progressively gone from being a social network focused on photography to being focused on short videos. The change is not going badly for the Meta social network. Last year he managed to be more downloaded than TikTok after the previous four in which it was surpassed by ByteDance, according to Sensor Tower. 767 million installations compared to 733, a growth for Instagram of 20% from 2022.
Curiously, it is now TikTok that is starting the same movement that Instagram already did, but in the opposite direction, with a new app dedicated to photographs: TikTok Photos.
The existence of TikTok Photos has been revealed after SpAndroid will decompile and analyze the latest version of the APK, the installation file of the short videos app, 33.8.4. In it they appear multiple references to TikTok Photos and even the logo that the application will have and that it maintains the same color scheme as TikTok.
The APK includes phrases like “Get TikTok Photos,” “Share this post on TikTok Photos,” and “Reach other like-minded people who enjoy photo posting,” among others. Also “Sync your posts with TikTok Photos,” implying that the photo-sharing app will offer interoperability with that of TikTokallowing users to sync their existing photos.
Currently, TikTok allows publish photos in the app in a limited way. It can be done with a single image, in video format, or create a sliding slideshow with filters, voiceovers, text and sound.
Another of the located texts refers to an imminent launch: “TikTok Photos is launching soon, we hope to help you gain new audiences on the new app nn If the switch is on, we will sync your public photos to the new app whether you close the pop-up or not.” However, TikTok has not yet released official information about the app and its expected release date.
The transformation of Instagram into a platform that prioritizes short videos, its popular Reels, has left users somewhat orphaned of an app focused on images like Meta used to be. This void is what TikTok Photos wants to fill.