Instagram overtook TikTok as the world's most downloaded app last year, at least in part thanks to the Reels feature it launched back in 2020 to take on its Chinese rival. While short-form videos on Meta's platform have improved over the years, many users think that Instagram is still no match for TikTok when it comes to bite-sized clips.

You can now skip ahead in Reels by holding down on either edge of the screen, which plays the video at double speed. Reels started out with a 15-second cap but can now run for up to three minutes, so playback controls make sense.

Meta-owned Instagram is copying yet another feature from TikTok. This time, it’s the ability for users to play a reel at 2x speed by long pressing on the right or left side of their screen. When TikTok first launched,