Instagram is heading to TV screens but its boss is not sure how people will use it

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As Instagram gets ready to roll out its new app for Amazon Fire smart TVs, its head Adam Mosseri has been refreshingly honest about one thing. He does not yet know how people will actually use Instagram on their televisions.

Speaking to Semafor a day before the launch, Mosseri said people might begin by watching Reels casually on a big screen or even sharing content together with others in the room. “We’re going to learn a lot,” he said. “I’m sure we’ll get a bunch of things wrong, but we’re gonna iterate quickly.”

The move brings Instagram out of the phone and into the living room, a space where YouTube already dominates attention. The TV app is both a sign of Instagram’s reach on mobile and a test of whether it can translate that success to larger screens. Unlike YouTube, which has leaned heavily into long, highly produced videos that feel closer to traditional television, Instagram is still built around short and constantly changing content.

Mosseri admitted that the platform’s position has also been shaped by what is happening around it. Pressure from the US government on TikTok has slowed one of Instagram’s biggest rivals, giving Meta room to adjust its own feed. He said TikTok is still better at helping new content break through, but Instagram does a better job of turning attention into revenue. He also questioned whether TikTok’s growing complexity will work outside China. “They had massive faith in short-form video long before anybody else did,” he said, adding that TikTok may now be turning into a Chinese-style super app, something that “may or may not work outside of China.”

For now, Instagram is not rushing into long videos. Mosseri said lengthy content does not work well on the platform today and that constant variety is part of what keeps users engaged. Still, he left the door open for change. “It might turn out that maybe we’ll need premium content to work,” he said. “It might be that we need long-form video.”

Looking ahead, Mosseri said Instagram plans to give users more control over what they see. New tools could allow people to directly shape their feeds or search more deeply into topics they care about. Over a longer horizon, he imagines a world where smart glasses replace phones, which could completely change how people interact with a visual app like Instagram.