Features
Reels — full screen, and only when you are looking
Short vertical video that fills the phone, swipes like it should, and starts playing the moment you arrive instead of after a download. The rule that matters most: a reel plays only while it is genuinely on screen.
Portrait fills, landscape fits
A portrait video covers the whole screen; a landscape one letterboxes on black instead of being cropped into nonsense.
Plays instantly
It starts the moment you arrive — no waiting for a download.
Two doors, one experience
You reach reels two ways: tapping one in your feed, which pushes the full-screen viewer, or opening the Reels section of Home, which takes the screen over the same way the moment it is actually in front of you. Opening Reels should look exactly like opening a reel — so it does, down to the immersive mode, which is released again as soon as you scroll back to the rest of Home.
From the feed
Tap a reel card and the viewer opens on that reel.
From Home
The Reels section is the same viewer, embedded — same feel, no back button needed.
One swipe per reel
Vertical paging, one video at a time, exactly the gesture everyone already has in their thumb.
Playback you can trust
A reel plays only while it is on screen — swiping to another Home section, switching bottom tabs, pushing a new screen or locking the phone all stop the sound. Video is saved on your phone as you watch, so the reels you come back to start instantly the second time.
No ghost audio
Nothing keeps playing once you leave the screen.
The controls on the reel
Double-tap likes; a second tap never unlikes. You get the heart and a haptic tick. The rail on the side carries live counters, and the author chip opens their profile. The overflow menu is wired to real things only: save the reel, copy its link, share it, follow or unfollow the person, report it, or delete it if it is yours — and the destructive ones ask first.
Copy link
sebairo.com/r/ plus the id — opens the app if installed, the web page if not.
Save for later
Saved reels land in the same Saved list as saved posts — one place, not two.
Report from here
Reporting is on the reel itself, where you saw the problem.
Reels are posts, so the rules are the same
A reel is a post whose kind is reel. It carries the same audience setting, the same comment and like-count controls, the same reporting, and the same place in My posts. That is why there is no second privacy model to learn: what you already know about a post is true of a reel. Ads appear occasionally as their own labelled pages.
Same audiences
The same four audiences as any post — chosen when you post.
No dark posts here
Sponsored content never appears as an ordinary reel — it comes only as its own labelled ad page.
One library
The video behind a reel is an asset in your media library, reusable without a second upload.
Questions people actually ask
How long can a reel be?
Reels are for short clips, and the viewer is built for clips rather than long films — there is no long-form video upload.
Why did the sound stop when I switched screens?
Because that is the design. A reel plays only while its page is actually visible and the app is in the foreground — so nothing keeps talking behind another screen or after you lock the phone.
Does double-tapping twice unlike a reel?
No, deliberately. Double-tap only ever likes. To remove a like, tap the heart in the rail — an intentional action for an intentional change.
Will a landscape video be cropped?
No. Portrait video covers the screen; landscape letterboxes on black, so nothing is ever cropped into nonsense.
Do reels use a lot of data?
Less than they would without the cache. Watched reels are stored on the device, so a second view costs nothing; and if you would rather video did not start on its own in the feed, autoplay can be set to muted or off.
Can I make a reel private?
Yes — a reel takes the same audience choice as any post: Public, Followers, Contacts or Only me.
How do I get my reel in front of more people?
Post it public so ranking and search can reach it, share the link, or promote it through Ads Manager with a budget you set yourself. There is no way to buy your way into someone's feed unlabelled — promoted posts are always marked sponsored.