Twitter embraces TikTok-style ‘immersive’ video

Videos on Twitter will now look a lot more like TikTok. The company announced that it’s switching to a full-screen “immersive” video player for watching clips. It’s also borrowing the now-familiar “swipe up” gesture that will allow people to endlessly scroll through more videos on the platform.

The update will make watching videos on Twitter feel a lot more like browsing TikTok or Instagram’s Reels, at least in terms of the user interface. The changes are limited to Twitter’s iOS app for now, but the company said a similar update for Android could arrive in the "coming weeks."

While Twitter has long promoted video, especially live video, in different parts of its app, the change is one of the company’s most aggressive moves to push video on its users. It could also prove controversial, as some users could find the new full-screen videos disruptive. The company notes that users can navigate back to the original tweet using the back arrow in the top left corner of a clip.

Separately, Twitter is also testing out a change to drive more people to video content across its platform. The company is experimenting with a new section for video recommendations in Twitter’s Explore page. Those suggestions will be “available to people in select countries using Twitter in English on iOS and Android.”