Instagram this week announced a new feature to make our DMs less junk when someone likes our SStory. This is the Private Story Likes, a dedicated button to appreciate someone’s SStory without sending a DM.

This seemed essential, as sending alike (heart symbol) for someone’s SStory now will send a message of such in their DMs. This could get worse if numerous people are responding in the same way. And all the likes can be viewed later in a dedicated Story’s view sheet.

Story Likes in Instagram

Aside from regular posts, Instagram’s one-day spanned stories are a good way of engaging with followers. After focusing enough on Reels, Instagram is now turning to Stories, with a new feature unveiled today as Private Story Likes.

As revealed by the platform’s CEO Adam Mosseri, there’s a new heart button set in between the “send message” text box and little aircraft icon of an Instagram story, which, if tapped, sends alike to the author of it. But unlike the previous versions, the sent-like won’t be going into the DMs of that author, making it less cluttered.

Having your DMs with less junk is appreciated, as a mere like onto SStory doesn’t need to be a message too. Also, there will not be a public count for SStory likes too. But an author can view who liked the SStory through a Story’s view sheet.

Instagram has been working on hiding the likes on posts for last years and finally decided to leave it to users. This is aimed at reducing social anxiety and express opinions better. And the now announced Private Story Likes is for making sure “that people can express more support for each other, but also to clean up DMs a little bit,” Mosseri said.

This is available for the US users to try now and will be coming to more users in other regions soon.