In recent weeks, some users have started noticing a rocket-shaped icon in their Facebook mobile app.
The icon, positioned right next to the main news feed icon, gives you a different type of news feed, one which displays popular posts from people and pages that you haven’t befriended or liked.
I’ve had the new feature on my Android phone for at least three weeks now, though it tends to disappear and reappear every now and then. (I’m based in Croatia, but there are also reports of users seeing the new icon in the UK.)
The rocket feed offers a great deal of local content, so it’s possible that it’s showing posts that are popular near my geographical location. However, I’m also seeing some posts that are relevant to my interests, so it might not be completely disassociated from my likes/friends.
Most of the posts I’m seeing in the new feed are from pages (some of which I’ve liked), and some are from users that aren’t my friends.
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Image: Stan Schroeder/Mashable
The new feed seems to be remarkably similar to Instagram’s Explore tab, which shows you posts that the company’s algorithms have determined to be relevant to your interests.
UPDATE: April 3, 2017, 2 p.m. CEST A reader (thanks, Petar) sent us a few screenshots of the new feature as seen on the iPhone, where it is slightly different. Here, the new feed (labeled “Explore”) has more of a magazine vibe to it, with two news items laid out side by side.
The new Explore feed looks a little different on the iPhone.
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Image: Petar Zivkovic
This isn’t the first time Facebook is testing a different type of news feed on a (typically small) subset of its users. For example, in April 2016 we’ve seen a new style of news feed which shows stories clustered around certain topics.
Mashable has contacted Facebook for more details on this new feature and will update the post when we hear back from them.
