Instagram’s Edits has been around for a year now, and it’s very obviously showing us where phone-based video making is going. It was introduced to make complicated phone editing easier, and it’s now being very heavily improved based on what creators tell them they want. Updates are planned for captions, colour, how fast a video plays, and pre-made templates. This is important because most short videos are now made directly on phones.
One year on: what Instagram Edits set out to fix
Edits was created to completely change how people edit on phones, without just copying all the complicated features of computer editing programs. The goal was to make it clear, fast, and give you control when making short videos specifically for social media. As Brett Westervelt, who leads the Edits team, says, they wanted to make creating simpler, but still have the tools be good enough for professionals. re
In the last year, the team has been concentrating on making the things you do every day in the app less annoying. There’s a teleprompter built in for reading scripts and recording your voice. The app gets lots of updates, over 130 features have been added, and many of these are based directly on what creators say they need. Westervelt explains that the team are always making changes based on how people are actually using the app.
From editing to end-to-end creation
Edits isn’t just about cutting and adding transitions to videos. It combines coming up with ideas, finding examples, writing scripts, the actual editing, and looking at how the video performs, all within Instagram. The “Ideas” section lets you save reels and sounds, add your own notes, and create outlines or storyboards for your videos from the very first thoughts.
Westervelt says that the “Ideas” section is a key part of the app, but not many people use it. He thinks it’s one of the most helpful things in Edits for planning and organising, and suggests lots of creators don’t realise how much they can organise their video content within Edits before they even start filming.
Community-led learning and templates
More and more, people are learning how to improve their skills from each other on Instagram, using guides, explanations, and current trends. As visual effects and video styles become popular, Edits helps you find them and also lets you look at how a reel was made – from the transitions to the sound.
What is coming next in year two
On April re2026, Edits celebrated its first birthday and said what its plans for the future are. The next step is to give you much more control, but still in a simple way. Caption tools, colour adjustments, and controls for how the speed of the video changes are the main updates, as well as being able to change the layout of the app and get better information about how your videos are doing.
Here are the main updates coming in the next few months:
-better captioning with more languages
-more detailed colour adjustment controls for a specific look
-speed changes that aren’t just suddenly faster or slower
-you’ll be able to choose which tools you have available and where they are
-the app will give you advice specific to you and more information about who’s watching
-changes to how the workspace looks, including having your most-used tools readily available
-themes for projects to make sure you use the same style for videos you make regularly
-a bigger selection of templates with layers of effects and parts that you can share
Edits is also a place to save your video clips and ideas. The company intends to make this even better with smarter suggestions and summaries of information, helping you decide what to make next and why you should make it.
AI and language reach
The AI in Edits is meant to help you, not to do everything for you. It can currently separate an object from the background in a scene, and remove pauses or unnecessary words from your recordings. Westervelt says AI is used to make things less work, but it won’t replace your creativity or your choices.
Being able to use more languages is becoming very important. Instagram has already used AI to create dubbing (replacing the sound with another language) to reach people in different countries. Edits will probably add features like dubbing and captions in two languages at the same time, so more people can understand the content without needing a lot of extra work to produce it.
Edits is also becoming more flexible in terms of the kinds of videos you can make. Although it’s mainly for short videos on Instagram, it isn’t limited to them. You can export videos up to 10 minutes long, and they’re planning to increase this length based on how many people want it. They’re making it clear that if creators want to do more, the app will be able to handle it.
For many creators, making a video from start to finish on your phone is now the normal way to work. Edits matches this change by bringing together planning, making, and looking at results all in one place. And as templates become more sophisticated, creators can share not just the finished video, but how they made it, which helps people learn more quickly across the whole platform.
More generally, Meta (Instagram’s parent company) is trying to make your smartphone a complete video studio. This is really working in India, where it’s now cheaper to get started, and a new group of creators are able to work without needing expensive equipment. An app that’s simple and improves based on feedback can turn an idea into a finished video more quickly.
The next stage will rely on finding the right balance. Having more features shouldn’t make it as complicated as computer editing programs. If Edits can continue to be easy to use while also giving you more control, it will remain accessible as creators become more ambitious. The last year has shown where it’s going; the next year will show if they can actually do it.
