Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Social Media
  3. Computing
  4. News

Meta plans to bring Avatars to Reels and video chat

Add as a preferred source on Google

Meta has announced further plans to expand one of its VR features to its other social media and messaging apps.

On Tuesday, during the keynote of its Meta Connect 2022 event, the parent company of Facebook announced that it would be working on bringing its Horizon social VR avatars to Reels, WhatsApp, and Messenger.

Horizon Avatars on Reels.
screenshot

Meta bringing its avatars to Reels appears to be part of its push to integrate avatars further with Meta’s other products such as Instagram, Facebook, Messenger, and WhatsApp.The technology company says that it wants users to be able to use avatars “anywhere you want to express yourself.”

Horizon Avatars on video chats.
screenshot

The company also announced that it was working on allowing users to use their avatars instead of their live video in video chats on WhatsApp and Messenger and that it considers the use of avatars in this way as a sort of “third mode” between “video on” and “video off.” Meta says that it expects to launch this avatar feature for video chats next year.

Anita George
Anita George has been writing for Digital Trends' Computing section since 2018. So for almost six years, Anita has written…
Snapchat Planets: What’s the order, and what do they mean?
Snapchat Planets turns your best friends list into a solar system, and yes, your orbit says a lot
Snapchat Planets being shown on the Snapchat app on iPhone.

Snapchat is already packed with little symbols that can be weirdly hard to decode. You have streaks, emojis, badges, scores, Best Friends, and if you use Snapchat Plus, a tiny solar system that shows where you sit in someone’s closest-friends list.

The feature is called Friend Solar System, though most people just call it Snapchat Planets. It takes your position in a friend’s Snapchat orbit and turns it into a planet. From Mercury to Neptune, these celestial bodies signify how close a person is to you.

Read more
Instagram Plus may tempt creators, but WhatsApp Plus is an easier skip
Meta rolls out paid featrues for Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp users worldwide
Instagram

Meta seems convinced that some users will pay a few dollars a month for extra controls, customization, and visibility inside its biggest apps. After initially testing these subscriptions with limited groups of users, the company is now expanding the idea globally across Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp.

Meta’s Plus plans are going global

Read more
X wants to stop creators from farming stolen viral clips for easy money
The platform is reducing payouts for users accused of reposting stolen content and gaming engagement.
Twitter X Logo Featured Banner

For years now, X has quietly rewarded one of the internet’s most annoying business models: stealing someone else’s content, reposting it faster, slapping “BREAKING” on top, and farming millions of impressions before the original creator even realizes what happened. Now, the platform finally seems ready to crack down on that entire ecosystem.

X says repost farmers and clickbait accounts are losing payouts

Read more