Facebook is taking on Zoom head-on.
The social media giant announced Messenger Rooms, a video-calling feature that allows up to 50 users to start a virtual hangout with no time limit.
You can invite anyone to join, even those who don’t have a Facebook account. Rooms can stay open to specific groups or friend circles and allow users to drop in and out, according to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Zuckerberg said a new feature at the top of your Newsfeed will show all active rooms. “You can just drop in or your friends can just drop into your room,” he said.
Eventually Facebook will roll out its Rooms to Instagram and WhatsApp.
Because of the way privacy concerns have become linked to Facebook lately, the company released a detailed post explaining how it ensured that privacy was protected in the new Messenger Rooms feature.
“We built Rooms with privacy in mind and designed controls to let you manage your experience,” wrote Erin Egan, Facebook’s Chief Privacy Officer, Policy. “The default privacy settings were designed to be consistent with what you’d expect for where you create a room. For example, rooms you create through a Facebook Group are open by default to members of that Group.”
And regardless of whether you use Rooms through your Facebook account or join as a guest, the social network doesn’t watch or listen to your audio or video calls, Ethan reassured.
The new feature is the clearest shot yet at Zoom, the videoconferencing service that has exploded in popularity since coronavirus lockdowns have forced people inside.
Zuckerberg said video chatting has “emerged as an incredibly important way people are relying on to stay connected to the people that they care about right now.”
In addition to the Messenger Room news, Zuckerberg announced that limits on WhatsApp video calls will be increased from only four users to eight starting next week.
You just opened X and started typing your thoughts. Imagine the jump scare when a hand suddenly pops up on your screen, pointing at the promote button. It doesn’t say a word and simply points. For a growing number of X users, this isn’t a made-up scenario but something they have been seeing since yesterday, and very few of them are amused.
Most of us have learned to tune out the usual in-app upsells, whether it’s a glowing upgrade banner or a pop-up about a premium plan. A floating hand hovering over your draft is much harder to ignore, and that’s probably the whole point.
Scroll through any app for five minutes, and you’ll find someone maxxing something. Their skin, their sleep, their protein intake, even their Friday night on the couch. That little suffix has been everywhere this year, and now it has a trophy to show for it. In a recent announcement, Dictionary.com named maxxing its 2026 Word of the Year.
What are people actually doing when they’re maxxing?
Instagram is testing a new format for long-form videos called Features. It allows select creators to upload horizontal videos running up to 90 minutes long. Instagram has already tested the new format with creators in Brazil, and now, it's expanding to tens of thousands of creators across the US.
How will Instagram's new Features format work?