Threads, the Twitter-like app from Instagram, is rolling out its “trending now” feature widely to all users in the U.S. The official rollout comes a month after the app started testing the feature with a select number of users in the country. Trending topics are available on the search page and in the app’s For You Feed.
In a Threads post, Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced the official launch and noted that the company sees it as “an easy way to see what others are talking about on Threads.”
The launch of trending topics will bring Threads more in line with X, as it will allow users to find timely conversations that are taking place on the social network. Up until now, Threads has been lacking a real-time sense of community, and the introduction of trending topics could help remedy this as it lets you get an idea of what people are currently discussing outside of what you see in your own feeds.
Meta previously told TechCrunch that trending topics are determined by Meta’s AI systems and are based on what people are engaging with on Threads. The system will take a number of different factors into account, such as how many people are talking about a given topic and how many users have engaged with posts on that same topic.
The feature is somewhat limited, as Threads only display five trending topics at a time, while X shows you multiple. It’s possible that Threads may be limiting the number of trending topics to prevent issues around safety and spam.
Although Meta has said Threads would not actively recommend political content, many of the topics that often trend on the platform are political in nature. During President Biden’s State of the Union address earlier this month, Threads’ trending topics were dominated by political chatter. Meta has been distancing itself from politics on its platforms for years, but the company isn’t suppressing politics in Threads’ trends feature. However, that could change in the future.
