Instagram is a social media platform with more heart icons. Is it a place of love and affection, or is this trend of the heart a little oversaturated? Instead of likes and likes, on Instagram, you can “heart” someone’s posts, send them “heartfelt” messages, or “heart” their comments.
The heart symbol is not something that Instagram invented and has been used on the Internet for many years, mainly by writing the less than sign followed by the number three (
Read on and discover everything about heart icons on Instagram, what they represent and what you can achieve with them.
1. The Instagram activity icon
The first heart icon you see on Instagram is the one in your feed. Every time you launch the Instagram app, you find a heart icon in the top right corner, next to your Direct Messages. Tapping the heart icon takes you to the “Activity” page.
When you tap it, you see all the likes on your posts from your friends and followers, any comments or posts you’ve been tagged in, any replies to comments you’ve made. and who followed you.
You also see “continue” requests at the top when your profile is set to private.
All previous notifications are viewed by tapping the “heart” activity icon at the top of the home page.
That particular heart icon on Instagram stands out the most. It’s a very transparent and neat feature that keeps all your social interactions on Instagram in one place.
So what’s the next Instagram heart icon? Keep reading.
2. Instagram Comment Heart Icon
The second “heart” icon found on Instagram appears next to each comment below each photo and video. Tap the heart to serve as a “Like.” If you want to like your comment for any reason, you can do that too. The “heart” button appears to the right of your comment, and the number of likes received appears below it.
Finally, you can like other people’s posts on Instagram by tapping the heart icon below the post or double-tapping the photo/video.
3. Instagram Direct Message Heart Icon
The heart icon on Instagram that gets a lot of hate (pun intended) is the one used in the Direct Message portion of the app. To like someone’s direct message, double-tap the inpidual message. People complain about accidentally sending hearts to strangers, their lovers, or worse, their exes.
To avoid confusion, Instagram initially had a heart icon at the bottom right of the Direct Message screen. Fortunately, Instagram listened to the many complaints and changed this some time ago. You will now see a sticker icon where there used to be a heart. You can still send a “heart” to someone this way, but you must tap it twice instead of once.
This was a welcome change because people avoid embarrassing themselves by accidentally touching the heart icon. If this has happened to you before, you know how bad it was.
Frequent questions
Here are the answers to more questions about the Instagram heart icon.
Can I cancel sending a heartfelt message?
Yeah! Fortunately, Instagram added the option for users to recover or cancel sending stickers, including the Heart sticker. All you need to do is long press the sticker and tap Cancel shipment. Confirm that you will delete the heart icon and it will disappear for you and the recipient.
Can I react from my heart to an Instagram DM?
Absolutely! Just like on Facebook, you can “Love” a message on Instagram. Press and hold the message you received and tap the first icon on the left (the heart icon). This is a convenient way to let others know you received and acknowledged the message, even if you don’t want to return anything.
In closing, “heart” emojis and symbols existed for a long time on the internet before Instagram adopted them, as mentioned above. Regardless, they will continue to survive on the Internet even if Instagram doesn’t. They are an essential part of social interaction on the web and people love to send them.
As for Instagram, no one likes to send something by mistake, and sending a spam heart is probably one of the most awkward things you can do on social media. At least now, you won’t accidentally send a “heart” and you can use them for more than one purpose: the feed, comments, and direct messages.
