Facebook has been no stranger in helping people get in touch with each other with its social network platform, including its own Messenger service that is set to be streamlined during the course of this year. However, that didn"t stop the company from snapping up WhatsApp for a cool $16 billion back in 2014 despite the lack of voice and video calling functionality, both of which were added during the course of the following year. Now, it appears that another Facebook property could potentially pick up these features.
Found lurking within the APKs for the Instagram and Instagram Direct apps for Android by Ishan Agarwal were several voice and video calling icons which could indicate an impending release of such features to the general public. Furthermore, a reference to video chat was found in the iOS version of the app, as spotted by 9to5Mac"s Guilherme Rambo.
Instagram video chat is also coming to iOS (but it"s clearly not ready just yet) https://t.co/JagC5ChC99 pic.twitter.com/vZjtrCtWwF
— Guilherme Rambo (@_inside) March 2, 2018
When TechCrunch reached out to Instagram for comment on the discovery, a spokesperson for the photo-sharing service said: "I"m afraid we can"t comment on this one".
While these capabilities, if released, would put Instagram on more of a level-footing with WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, it remains to be seen if users will end up taking advantage of them. However, should that eventuate, that could land yet another blow against its major competitor, Snapchat, which saw its stock price slump last year after many of its features had been copied by its rival.
Source: TechCrunch via Engadget