Instagram Chief Says Chronological Feed Is 'Much Worse'

Instagram Chief Calls Chronological Feed 'Much Worse'

As new legislation in Australia aims to let users opt out of the algorithmic nature of modern social media, Instagram's Adam Mosseri has said that the experience of a chronological feed is "much worse." Reported by ABC, Mosseri said that "the average user experience gets much worse" when going back to a chronological feed.

The Instagram chief didn't stop there, painting a bleak picture of what he believes a chronological feed would actually look like in practice. In his view, the problems stack up quickly for the average person scrolling through their app.

His comments come as Australia pushes forward with rules designed to give users more control over whether algorithms decide what they see. Mosseri's remarks, however, suggest he sees that control as coming at a real cost to the people who ask for it.

Australia's Push to Let Users Opt Out of Algorithms

New legislation in Australia aims to let users opt out of the algorithmic nature of modern social media. The push would give people the choice to step away from the curated, engagement-driven feeds that dominate platforms today and return to a simpler, time-ordered experience.

That prospect drew a pointed response from Instagram's Adam Mosseri. Reported by ABC, the Instagram chief argued that "the average user experience gets much worse" when going back to a chronological feed.

His warning arrives as lawmakers weigh whether users should be handed control over how their feeds are built. For Mosseri, the algorithmic feed is not simply a business preference but a better product — a claim that sits at the center of the debate over whether platforms should be required to offer a non-algorithmic option at all.

Mosseri's Full Argument Against Chronological Feeds

Mosseri's case against a chronological feed rests on a simple claim: "the average user experience gets much worse" when you go back to one. In comments reported by ABC, he laid out the chain of consequences he sees.

First, a chronological feed "ends up getting overwhelmed with content from companies, brands, and publishers." Because those accounts can post constantly, their output dominates the timeline. The next casualty is creators: they "get drowned out," Mosseri said, and after that "your friends get drowned out even more."

For users, the result is twofold. You "miss a lot more content," and, in his most revealing line, "you spend a lot less time on the platform."

That last point is telling, since time spent is a core metric for Instagram. But there is a real argument underneath it: in a chronological feed, a larger quantity of posts improves reach, so always-on influencers and businesses benefit most from their ability to post more.

Why a Chronological Feed Could Drown Out Friends

Mosseri's warning about chronological feeds centers on a simple numbers problem. In a chronological feed versus an algorithmic one, a larger quantity of posts would indeed improve reach. As a result, constantly-online influencers, businesses, and others would absolutely benefit from their ability to post more content.

That could drown out content from close friends, assuming the user is actually following all of these other accounts in the first place. Mosseri described exactly this dynamic, saying that a chronological feed “ends up getting overwhelmed with content from companies, brands, and publishers… Creators get drowned out, and then your friends get drowned out even more.”

In other words, the accounts best positioned to benefit from a chronological feed are those posting most frequently, not necessarily those a user cares about most. Friends who post occasionally would compete directly with high-volume publishers, and the sheer weight of that output could push personal updates out of view.