TikTok Testing Instagram-Inspired Features: Report

The wildly popular short video-sharing app TikTok is reportedly mulling to launch a host of new features that seem to have been inspired by Facebook-owned Instagram. The features were discovered by reverse-engineering specialist Jane Manchun Wong who posted screengrabs of the features on Twitter.

The purported Instagram-inspired features include a grid-style layout, an account switcher, and a Discover page, among others.

"We're always experimenting with new ways to improve the app experience for our community," the spokesperson was quoted as saying by the TechCrunch on Saturday.

The TikTok spokesperson, however, declined to offer further details about the company's plans but confirmed the features were things the company is working on.

Earlier this week, speculation was rife that social networking giant Facebook was preparing the launch of a serious competitor to TikTok. Jason Toff, who earlier served as the General Manager for Twitter's short-video sharing service Vine, has joined as Facebook's Product Management Director to lead the company's recently formed New Product Experimentation (NPE) team.

While Toff said he could not reveal details of what he is working on, his Twitter post mentioned he is looking to hire a team of UX designers and engineers to work on the project.

Owned by a Beijing-based startup named ByteDance, TikTok saw its first-time installs grow about 28 percent year-over-year for the first half of 2019 to nearly 344 million globally despite a two-week ban in India during the second quarter (Q2), revealed an estimate by mobile app intelligence firm Sensor Tower.

TikTok has 700 million users globally, out of which nearly 200 million are in India.