Meta is moving forward in its efforts to expand the user base of its generative AI-powered products. The business is experimenting with putting Meta AI in the Instagram search bar for both chat with AI and content discovery, in addition to testing the chatbot Meta AI with people in places like India on WhatsApp.
You can utilize one of the pre-loaded prompts or ask questions during a conversation with Meta AI using the search query in the search box. Aravind Srinivas, CEO of Perplexity AI, pointed out that the prompt screen’s design is similar to the startup’s search screen thanks to the interface.
Beyond that, though, it could help you in finding new Instagram content. For example, a user-posted video on Threads shows you may touch on a cue such as “Beautiful Maui sunset Reels” to get Reels that are associated with that topic.
A few users TechCrunch spoke with separately had the option to ask Meta AI to look up recommendations for Reels.
This indicates that Meta intends to leverage generative AI for purposes other than text generation, such as revealing new content from social media platforms like Instagram.
TechCrunch was able to verify Meta’s Instagram AI experiment. The business does not, however, say whether or not it used generative AI technology for search.
A Meta representative told TechCrunch, “Our generative AI-powered experiences are under development in varying phases, and we’re testing a range of them publicly in a limited capacity.”
Numerous websites concerning the quality of Instagram search are available. Therefore, it would not be shocking if Meta attempted to enhance search through the application of generative AI.
In addition, Meta would want Instagram to be easier to find than TikTok. Google debuted a new viewpoints feature last year to display results from TikTok and Reddit. Reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi revealed earlier this week on X that Instagram is developing a feature called “Visibility off Instagram” that could allow postings to appear in search engine results.
