Facebook Stories Now Have Twice The Users As Snapchat

Snapchat might have perfected the “story” feature for users–but Facebook now has twice the number of people uploading “stories” to their profiles.

“Facebook Stories, whose striking resemblance to Snapchat stories raised eyebrows when it was launched two years ago, now has over 500 million daily users,” Business Insider reports. “Facebook Stories are a short photo or video updates that disappear after 24 hours, and the format is a direct imitation of Snapchat’s Stories feature. Facebook has also replicated the feature across its other social apps, Instagram and WhatsApp.”

Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, also has roughly 500 million users a day posting stories. Snapchat–which invented the feature–has only 190 stories uploaded every day.

You might think Facebook stories are just another way to keep your friends and family updated on your daily activities. But there is, quite literally, more to the story.

“Facebook isn’t just using Stories to keep people engaged, but to squeeze more cash out of them. Today COO Sheryl Sandberg announced that 3 million advertisers have now bought Stories ads across Facebook’s family of apps,” Josh Constine of TechCrunch reports. “I’d expect Facebook to launch a Stories Ad Network soon so other apps can show Facebook’s vertical video ads and get a cut of the revenue.”

Keep that in mind when you create your next Boomerang video or photo shoot and upload it to your Facebook story.