Instagram is now rolling out a new feature that will make users’ lives a little easier. Namely, you don’t have to respond as much as you might like. The platform is introducing an option called Private Story Likes. With this, you simply give a ‘like’ to a recently posted story of your friends.
Previously, when you wanted to respond to a story of your friends, that message came in as a dm (direct message). It didn’t matter if you sent an emoji or a full message. You can still do that, if you want – but there’s now another option available: Private Story Likes.
Story on Instagram ‘likes’
Now when you view a story on Instagram, you’ll also find a heart icon there. CEO Adam Mosseri explains this in a video on Twitter. “When you tap on that, you send a like to the creator,” he said. That like does not end up in the user’s dm’s, but in the personal overview of activities on the platform.
Twitter won’t load because you didn’t give permission.
Private Story Likes
Starting to roll out today, you can now send some love by liking people’s stories without sending a DM.
Likes on stories are private and do not have counts. Rather, they appear as hearts next to people’s handles in your Stories view sheet. 
pic.twitter.com/l56Rmzgnnw
– Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) February 14, 2022
So that should save a lot of back and forth on Instagram. Sometimes you come across a video that is cool, but not worth the energy of a reaction. In those cases you can now just hand out a like. You express your appreciation, while the action costs you little energy.
No ‘like counts
However, stories on Instagram do not get ‘like counts’. This is a number that represents how many likes a post has received. This is a different approach than the service uses for regular posts, where everyone can see how many likes a post has received. However, users can choose to hide the number of likes.
So the likes you give out to Instagram stories only appear in the user’s personal view. You can see them listed when you open your own story and check who all viewed it. “The idea behind the button is that you can express your support without your dm mailbox overflowing,” Mosseri said.
