TikTok recently announced two new features rolling by it's interface, the first being labelled a "Green Screen Duet", and the other being "Topics".
TikTok's consistent attempts at updating itself are, more than anything else, a symptom of competition in the marketplace. With newer venues such as YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels attempting their best to catch up with (or run down) its success, updating is the only way to maintain relevance. Having said that, TikTok's updates seem rather focused on producing actual functional advances, as opposed to fiddling with minutia for the sake of making something new. On that note, let us take a look at the features, and what they offer.
Green Screen Duets seem rather self explanatory from the name itself. Duets are an iconic feature of TikTok, allowing users to interact with each other in order to produce content. Be it singing together, acting out a skit, or reacting to other content, there's a lot of creativity that duets inspire. The rather famous "Wellerman" video's a great example of users coming together for duets. The green screen feature's been a part of TikTok for a while as well, inspiring users to add images and special effects to their background. Green Screen Duets just put both features together! Users in both windows of a duet TikTok can use green screens in order to inspire further ingenuity. It's a handy, flexible tool that the community will no doubt put to good use.
The other feature we're talking about today is the Topics sub-menu. Essentially, this new addition to the TikTok interface works much like a category feature on other video streaming applications. Topics has been added to the Discover menu, next to the Trends sub-menu, and hosts TikTok categories such as Comedy, Animals, Family, Beauty, and Food. The sub-menu listings all consist of popular topics of interest on the platform, and grouping TikToks together in such an easily accessible manner is honestly a solid revamp to the app as a whole.
Either of the features are not available to all TikTok users currently. The app's developers have revealed that both Green Screen Duets and Topics are currently being tested within the USA, and have been for the past few weeks. This is ultimately just another way of beta testing the new feature, and thus we should expect them rolling out to a larger audience soon enough.
Read next: TikTok is Launching a Shopping Tab On Its Platform Along with A Guardian and Recruitment Guide
TikTok's consistent attempts at updating itself are, more than anything else, a symptom of competition in the marketplace. With newer venues such as YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels attempting their best to catch up with (or run down) its success, updating is the only way to maintain relevance. Having said that, TikTok's updates seem rather focused on producing actual functional advances, as opposed to fiddling with minutia for the sake of making something new. On that note, let us take a look at the features, and what they offer.
Green Screen Duets seem rather self explanatory from the name itself. Duets are an iconic feature of TikTok, allowing users to interact with each other in order to produce content. Be it singing together, acting out a skit, or reacting to other content, there's a lot of creativity that duets inspire. The rather famous "Wellerman" video's a great example of users coming together for duets. The green screen feature's been a part of TikTok for a while as well, inspiring users to add images and special effects to their background. Green Screen Duets just put both features together! Users in both windows of a duet TikTok can use green screens in order to inspire further ingenuity. It's a handy, flexible tool that the community will no doubt put to good use.
The other feature we're talking about today is the Topics sub-menu. Essentially, this new addition to the TikTok interface works much like a category feature on other video streaming applications. Topics has been added to the Discover menu, next to the Trends sub-menu, and hosts TikTok categories such as Comedy, Animals, Family, Beauty, and Food. The sub-menu listings all consist of popular topics of interest on the platform, and grouping TikToks together in such an easily accessible manner is honestly a solid revamp to the app as a whole.
Either of the features are not available to all TikTok users currently. The app's developers have revealed that both Green Screen Duets and Topics are currently being tested within the USA, and have been for the past few weeks. This is ultimately just another way of beta testing the new feature, and thus we should expect them rolling out to a larger audience soon enough.
Read next: TikTok is Launching a Shopping Tab On Its Platform Along with A Guardian and Recruitment Guide
