Instagram crosses 27 million downloads, previews Android app

Instagram, the hugely popular photo editing and sharing app on iOS, revealed that it had passed 27 million downloads on the Apple store, and said an Android app would be available very soon.

In a fireside chat Sunday at South by Southwest Interactive, Co-founder of Instagram Kevin Systrom showed those gathered there a glimpse of the upcoming version of the app, which is currently being tested in a private beta.

Techcrunch reported that Systrom waved the phone around very briefly on-stage, but he didn’t give a full demo. “That’s for later, and the company tells us they aren’t totally ready for a walkthrough yet”, said the site. However it quoted Stystrom as saying that “In some ways, it’s (the Android app) is better than our iOS app. It’s crazy".

The report also said that co-founder Mike Krieger had mentioned that the people at Android have been pretty impressed with the way the app leverages the platform. It’s taken awhile to come to Android simply because the company was focused on scaling on iOS, Systrom said.

“I don’t think it took us so long. We just had priorities. Had we tried to be both on Android and iPhone at the same time, it would’ve been tough to innovate in the way that we have,” he said.

Tech site Wired immediately spoke to a group of avid Android users , who were all predictably thrilled at the news.

Instagram allows users to add various innovative filters to photographs and share them with others. It earned the honor of being Apple’s iPhone app of the year for 2011 and has quickly amassed a tight-knit community of smartphone photographers.