August 2025 Social Media Platform Updates
Thursday 4th August 2025
by Beth Perrin
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As the summer draws to a close, it’s time for us to look back at some of the top new social media features that were released by our favourite platforms throughout August. Whether you’re an individual user or a brand marketing professional, plenty of fresh updates have arrived over the past month that will improve your online experience and give you more ways to connect, converse and create.
WhatsApp Scam Activity Alerts
As well as taking down over 6.8 million accounts that were linked to criminal scam centres around the world, WhatsApp began the month by introducing a range of new tools to help people spot scams and stay safe while messaging on the platform.
• Group chats
WhatsApp will now show you when someone who isn’t in your contacts adds you to a group you may not recognise. The alert will include key information about the group and tips to stay safe, and will give you the opportunity to exit the group without ever having to look at the chat.
• Individual chats
The app will now caution you when you start a chat with someone not in your contacts, and will show you additional context about who you’re messaging. This is because scammers often attempt to initiate contact with people elsewhere on the internet before asking them to message them on private messengers like WhatsApp.
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Instagram Reposts, Friends Map & Friends Reels
Instagram has launched several new ways to help users better connect with their friends on the platform, saying: “People have always come to Instagram to share what they’re up to and where they are - now, with [the following tools], it’s easier for you and your friends to stay in touch through the content you’re enjoying on Instagram.”
• Reposts
You can now repost public reels and feed posts, making it easier for you to share your interests and favourite videos with your friends. Reposts will be recommended to your friends’ and followers’ feeds, and they’ll also appear in a separate tab on your profile so you can revisit them later.
• Friends map
Similar to Snapchat’s popular Snap Map, you can now opt into sharing your active location with selected friends. Any content that’s been tagged with a location can show up on the map too.
• Friends reels
A new tab now appears within the reels section of the app, where you can see reels your friends have interacted with.
New on @instagram: repost Reels and in-feed posts, check out what your friends are up to on the Instagram map and see the content they’re loving in the Friends tab in Reels.https://t.co/z06iSUCs3e
— Meta Newsroom (@MetaNewsroom) August 6, 2025
New Animations for LinkedIn Announcements
LinkedIn has a series of GIFs and image templates that users can include when sharing various professional achievements and announcements, such as a smiling sun, two planes flying upwards, a group of people dancing around a cupcake, and more. Now, thanks to a recent update, you’ll see 16 new celebration animations to choose from when writing a post about a new job, project, milestone or anniversary, giving you more options that match your personal style and message.
Threads Post Counter
Threads has added a new counter that indicates how many linked posts there are in the full sequence, and where the reader is currently up to. This means that instead of having to manually type something like ‘1/3’, ‘2/3’ at the end of each post in your thread, the platform will now do it for you, making it easier to create longer topic discussions, and clearer for others to read them.
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New LinkedIn Post Analytics
LinkedIn has rolled out an update to its post-level analytics, which will provide users with more information about how their posts are performing. After publishing a post, you’ll now begin to receive notifications that will let you know when your content has resulted in profile views or new followers, alongside impressions. These notifications will come periodically as your content continues to reach more audiences, including at the three day and seven day after-posting mark.
AI-Powered Translations for Reels
Meta is rolling out AI translations, a new tool that automatically dubs and lip syncs any spoken audio in your Facebook and Instagram reels into another language, helping creators reach and connect with audiences all over the world. The company hopes this will allow more users to grow a global following, and open up their content to new audiences that may not have found it accessible before.
The translated audio uses the sound and tone of your own voice so it feels authentically you, and the lip syncing feature matches your mouth’s movements to the translated audio, so it looks like you’re really speaking the language in the reel. You can also review or remove translations at any time if they don’t seem quite right.
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Link Multi-Part Reels on Instagram
Instagram creators can now link reels together that build on each other, whether they’re part of an ongoing series or follow-ups to previous videos. This will make it easier for users to tell stories via their content, and for viewers to follow along and discover more of that creator’s reels.
To link reels, simply tap on the ‘Link a reel’ option when adding your caption, or tap the overflow menu on a previously uploaded reel.
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WhatsApp AI Writing Help
WhatsApp has introduced a new AI writing assistant called Writing Help, explaining that “Sometimes you know what you want to say, but just need a little help with how to say it”. The tool, which is powered by Meta’s secure AI technology Private Processing, will give users a range of message suggestions in various styles - such as professional, funny, or supportive. To view these suggestions, simply start typing your message in an individual or group chat, then tap the new pencil icon.
What do you think of the rise of AI features within messaging apps? Here at 3sixfive we’re all about the human approach, and always recommend that brands and businesses steer clear of bots when it comes to customer conversations - you can share your thoughts on this with us over on X @3sixfivepro.
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New Audio & Video Tools in TikTok DMs
TikTok rounded off the month by adding some new DM features to help users better connect with their friends and followers, and to make it easier for them to share their favourite media too.
• Audio messages
You can now record minute-long audio clips by holding down on the microphone icon beside the text box - just bear in mind that as soon as you release the microphone button, you’ll send that audio as a message.
• Attach photos & videos
You can now send up to nine images or videos as attachments to your DMs, either by selecting them from your camera roll, or capturing them with the TikTok camera.
Summary
We’d love to hear if you’ve tried any of these updates yet, and which ones have been beneficial for you or your brand. Find us on X @3sixfivepro to share which new features you’re excited to use throughout the remainder of Q3, and let us know which social media platforms are currently giving you the best results when it comes to engaging in conversations or creating content.
