Social media is slowly becoming a medium to gain ‘Likes’ and eventually fame, which spoils the true essence and use of it—to communicate. With this, the two social media giants today, Facebook and Instagram, recently allow users to hide Like counts on their feed posts. With the current COVID-19 crisis, the number of users and the number of hours spent on both sites have escalated.

The new function has been in trials since 2019, aiming to normalize user experience. Many people have been posting to gain popularity or even reputation. The idea seeks to block the anxiety and embarrassment of users over their social media posts that didn’t receive “enough” Likes. This dilemma is more common to young and young adult users, who think highly of what others think of them. On Facebook, users should go to the “Settings & Privacy” area under News Feed Settings (or News Feed Preferences on desktop). From there, you’ll see an option to “Hide number of reactions”. Meanwhile, on Instagram, you can utilize the option by going to the post itself. From there you will see a set of three dots on the upper-right corner, which contains the “Hide Like Count” feature.

In this “Like-free” space, users can now interact with others unworriedly. After all, social networking sites were created for people to stay connected with friends, family, and colleagues.