According to a report by Tech Crunch, Instagram users may soon be able to do some high-tier DM sliding via desktop, with the company testing a web-based version of the service internally.
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If the feature is released publically, it would allow folks without the app to send and receive direct messages on a Mac, PC, or any other device with an internet browser. The tip was given to Tech Crunch by Jane Manchun Wong, who says the chat feature is still being heavily tested within the company by employees.
According to a screenshot sent by Wong, the desktop DMs would sit at the top of the window and use the same icon the Instagram app does – a little paper plane thingo. There’s no indication of what the actual chat window looks like yet, but I doubt it’ll be anything wild. I mean, it’s still just a fucking chat window.
Given Instagram is a Facebook-owned platform, it’ll be interesting to see whether it’ll cop the Messenger treatment and become a standalone app or whether it’ll forever be tied to the picture sharing behemoth. Either way, you can probably expect to see your DMs pick up a little bit of steam if/when the release goes public.
It’s also another edge Instagram will have over Snapchat, who is yet to take a dive into anything web-based and, let’s face it, probably never will. As always, there’s no indication of when you can expect to see a rollout of desktop DMs, but I’d wager it’ll be within the next six months if it does make it past testing (it very likely will).
At any rate, start prepping that extra tab in your Chrome window now, folks.
