Meta’s TikTok clone, Facebook Reels, rolls out globally

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I hate to be the bearer of bad news but expect to see more Facebook Reels content in your News Feed (sorry, Feed). Meta, Facebook’s parent company, is now rolling out the TikTok clone in an additional 150 countries after launching it in the US in September. 

What are Facebook Reels? Good question. In simple terms, it’s the company’s answer to TikTok’s short-form videos. Since Meta has no plans to buy them, the next logical solution is ripping them off, as it does with pretty much everything that directly competes with them. 

We briefly touched upon this in a previous post, but Reels, much like TikTok, lets users create short-form videos with overlaid music and filters. If you’re familiar with TikTok, then Reels should sound extremely familiar.

Meta is adding new features to Facebook Reels that mimick a lot of the stuff that TikTok is already doing, including:

Directly from Meta, here are some of the new features coming:

• Remix: Create your own reel alongside an existing, publicly-shared reel on Facebook. When you create a Remix, you can create a reel that includes all or part of another creator’s reel. 
• 60-second Reels: Make reels up to 60 seconds long.
• Drafts: You will soon be able to create a reel and choose to “Save As Draft” below the Save button. 
• Video Clipping: In the coming months, we’re planning to roll out video clipping tools that will make it easier for creators who publish live or long-form, recorded videos to test different formats. 

It’s no secret that Meta needs Reels to succeed, so they will be pushing it pretty hard. So in time, expect to see this new format in places like Stories, Watch, your feed, and even Groups.

READ MORE: Instagram really wants you to stop sharing TikToks as Reels

While Facebook Reels has been readily available in the states, I haven’t seen it gain traction. I’ve yet to see one of these Reel posts pop up in my feed, but then again, I don’t regularly check Facebook, so that probably plays a large factor.

Have any thoughts on this? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

Editors’ Recommendations:

• Meta might pull Facebook and Instagram from Europe over ad targeting
• Apple will rip $10 billion from Facebook’s pockets this year
• For the first time ever, Facebook user numbers actually dropped
• Facebook rounds out the year as the least trusted tech company

Kevin Raposo

Kevin is KnowTechie's founder and executive editor. With over 15 years of blogging experience in the tech industry, Kevin has transformed what was once a passion project into a full-blown tech news publication. Shoot him an email at kevin@knowtechie.com.