Released five years ago, Snapchat is an image messaging and multimedia platform that has taken the world of social media by storm.
Our review: 5/5
Available on: iOS, Android
Unlike other social media platforms that allow photo sharing, Snapchat is unique in many ways – in particular, you get to choose how long your friends can see your images or videos for.
People use Snapchat to send images to their friends, either directly or to multiple chats. Over the years, Snapchat has grown with incredible new features – making it one of this generation’s favourite social media platforms.
You have the standard photo – you can choose selfie mode or normal mode. To take the picture, you press the round button at the bottom. To take a video, hold the button down. Sounds pretty basic, right?
But there is so much more…
1. Get to know Snapchat With a few easy steps, you can take your simple picture to the next level. By swiping left or right over the picture you can add filters, the time, the speed you’re going or even a personalised message. Even better, look at the top right-hand side of the screen at the tools – add stickers, text, drawing and other photo modifiers! Best of all – choose how long your chats get to see your photo for – you can send a picture and let it disappear in seconds!
2. Add a 'Snapchat filter' to your face All you have to do is make sure the camera is set to selfie mode, press and hold the screen where your face is, and scroll through all the different options. The effect will move as you do, and some will even prompt you to open your mouth, tap the screen, look around, etc. to change the effect even more. If you want to move away from you, and turn the camera over to your friends with the same effect – you can. Just turn the camera back-to-front mode and a similar effect to the filter you have chosen will appear in the background of the scene. Hey, don’t forget your friends! Another awesome feature of these Snapchat interactive filters is that some of them can include your friends.
3. How to add Stories to your Snapchat profile Snapchat was also the first social media platform to add the “Story” feature. This is where you can save multiple snaps for all of your friends to see in a sequence, and it lasts for 24 hours only. To add a snap to your “story”, press the square icon with a ‘+’ on it – and it's done! Not only can you also watch your friends’ stories, you can also get worldwide recommended content in a feature called “Discover” by clicking the dotted sphere in the top right-hand corner. Snapchat is always adding some new extra features, like saving memories, gaining Snapchat trophies and ads for upping your Snapchat game!
4. You can draw with emojis. To get started, tap the pen drawing tool, then the star emoji under the colour bar. Simply choose the emoji you would like to fill the picture with and start drawing away!
5. Share your Snaps with friends There are two different ways you can do this. If you press the blue arrow button in the bottom right corner of the screen, a list of your Snapchat friends will pop up. Just select the people you want to share the photo with, and hit send. Another way is to directly send it to a friend in a private chat. If you swipe right on a specific name on the chat delivery list, a private chat will open – allowing you to send private images and messages. But even then – after you exit the conversation – all of that conversation will have disappeared. If at any point you need to change any settings in your account – no problem. Click on the cog icon and this will pop up. Don’t forget to keep updated with adding friends and who is adding you. Swipe down on the screen for this option.
This app gets a five-star rating from us, get it now!...
