Alert: The Newest Instagram Feature Will Let You Keep Your Stories Forever

Your favorite app just got another update. Today, Instagram unrolled a new feature where your stories don't have to disappear after 24 hours. In fact, you can save your stories forever under the new "Stories Archive" section (privately) or "Stories Highlights" section (publicly)—with instant access to share on your profile. So basically, no more rushing to download each picture or video you upload to your story before it expires. (Thanks, Instagram.)

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Today we’re introducing two new tools to help you hold on to your favorite moments from Instagram Stories and share them in new ways that help you express yourself. Stories Highlights is a new part of your profile where you can show more of who you are through stories you’ve shared. And to help you build highlights, your stories will now automatically save into a private Stories Archive so you can easily relive them. Now you can group stories into highlights and feature them on your profile. To create a highlight, tap the “New” circle, choose stories from your archive, select a cover and give it a name. Your highlight will appear as a circle on your profile that can be played as a stand-alone story. Moving forward, your stories will automatically save to your Stories Archive. To see yours, tap the archive icon on your profile, then tap on any story to watch it. From there, you can add it to your current story, share it as a post or add it to a highlight on your profile. Only you can see your archived stories, and you can turn off auto-archiving at any time in your profile settings. To learn more about Stories Highlights and Stories Archive, check out help.instagram.com. Today’s updates are available as part of Instagram version 25 on iOS and Android. Video by @yelldesign

A post shared by Instagram (@instagram) on Dec 5, 2017 at 7:04am PST

If this feature reminds you of last year's Snapchat launch of its "Memories" section, you're not wrong. It's a similar concept, and if you enable the "Archives" section on Instagram your stories can live there along with the rest of the posts you decide to save. Any stories you decide to post to your profile will now go on top of it—giving your profile a *major* design update.

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When the story archive is available for your specific account, you’ll get a notification inside the app. This is a big step for Instagram, and especially useful for brands/influencers/celebrities who want to share their content for more than a limited time. Imagine getting to witness Chrissy Teigen's stories forever. 😱 Stay tuned.