Here is how to get started with Instagram Live as the company rolls it worldwide

tech2 News StaffJan 26, 2017 12:34:46 IST

Instagram announced that it is rolling out the "new" Live Stories feature worldwide. This feature was introduced back in November to counter the popularity of Snapchat by mashing Facebook Live with Instagram Stories to make Instagram Live Stories. If you've used Snapchat before, you know where Facebook got the idea from.

The feature was limited to users in the United States in November and the company announced that it will roll out the feature for users all across the world in the coming week.

One thing to note is that the feature will be only available for users who have installed Instagram 10.0 or above. To get started with a live story, you need to open the Instagram app and then swipe from the left edge towards the right. This gesture will open the Instagram camera in 'Normal' mode and you need to tap on 'Live' at the bottom portion to switch to 'Live' mode. This will change the Instagram camera shutter button to a 'Start Live Video' button.

The interface gives you standard options to turn on the flash or switch the camera. You can tap on the cog wheel on the top left corner to change the privacy settings of the stories. You can hide the live videos from specific people and you can save the videos that you share in the 'Story Settings' menu. Once you tap on 'Start Live Video', you can see the video live along with comments from people in the bottom half of the screen.

Instagram also notifies people about you going live and you can see the number of people watching live at a particular time.