It’s hard for me to believe that Instagram still doesn’t have a dedicated app for the iPad. After all, the iPad arrived in 2010, and the Instagram app arrived shortly after. However, there’s been no official Instagram app for the iPad in almost 15 years … but that might soon change. According to a new report, Meta is working on bringing Instagram to the iPad.
As reported by The Information and The Verge, the iPad version of Instagram has finally entered development. Keep in mind that Meta itself hasn’t confirmed it, and it’s unclear if or when the app will be available for download, but this is still more news than we’ve gotten in years.
When asked about making a dedicated iPad app, Meta usually either ignored the question or said that it simply wasn’t a top priority at the time. Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, once responded on X (Twitter): “It’s still just not a big enough group of people to be a priority. Hoping to get to it at some point, but right now, we’re very heads down on other things.”
To this, one user responded that that group of people would get bigger if there was a dedicated app. Mosseri shared some interesting insights as a result, saying that each surface “adds overhead,” meaning that expanding to more platforms increases costs. Mosseri also said that TikTok and YouTube are “behemoths,” forcing Instagram to adapt. Lastly, he said: “We are leaner than you think,” implying that the team may not have had the resources to expand to the iPad.
With that said, Instagram works on iPad — it’s just not an optimized experience. You can use the iPhone app, which looks weird on a big screen, or the web version, which scales fine. Still, many users would certainly enjoy having an iPad-only app.
If this is true, then what changed? The Information claims that the constant chaos surrounding TikTok motivated Meta to pay more attention to Instagram.
There’s a lot happening for Apple right now, with WWDC dates confirmed and iOS 19 on the horizon. It’d be nice for Meta to release the iPad app soon, too, but no one knows if and when that’s going to happen.
Monica is a computing writer at Digital Trends, focusing on PC hardware. Since joining the team in 2021, Monica has written…
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