Mobile devices are everywhere, and their interface is just getting better and better. However, there are limits on how touch interface can do in term of receiving user input. Apple with its iPhone 6S has introduced a feature called 3D Touch to enhance its touch interface, bringing input options to a whole wide of new possibilities.
Initially limited to iOS, Android users can also experience the same (similar) thing with Instagram.
The feature has been experimented by the photo-sharing social media since November 2015. It has been trying to replicate the Apple's trending pressure-sensitive technology and bake it into its Android app.
Instagram feature is similar to Apple's Force Touch (a basic variant of the company's 3D Touch). Instagram called it "Peek". With the ability to perform similarly, Peek enables users to preview a picture by simply pressing it for a longer period. This helps users to see a picture in an uncompressed format, without needing the app to download. The user can then drag their finger to either Like, look at the the uploader's Profile, or Share it.
The word "Peek" here comes from the functionality that pops up a card-like foreground of a task while making the rest of the UI blurs out.
Essentially, Force Touch, 3D Touch and Peek are to mimic a right-click action on desktop computers, With the feature, users can perform certain tasks using fewer taps. And with the technology baked inside Instagram, users can have a whole different user-experience in using the social media.
Beside quick-access functionality to its most commonly used feature, users can also experience a unique haptic feedback from the screen when they hover their finger over one of the buttons.
Instagram's Peek feature for photos has been available on iPhone 6S and 6S Plus. But when it was first introduced to Android, it experienced a brief suspension because of some technical issues. At that moment, Instagram also decided to remove the Peek feature from iOS, thinking that the feature would work fine on Apple with 3D Touch. And after a brief trial of two months, Instagram ported the feature to Android after realizing that the feature could also work on Android.
Android's version of Instagram with Force Touch was momentarily introduced on version 7.13.0, taken off on a few later versions, and re-introduced on version 7.14.0. Some highend smartphones were already getting their beta version as updates, whereas others are waiting in queue.
Pressure-Sensitive Inputs: iOS and Android
When differentiating Apple's Force Touch and 3D Touch with Instagram's Peek, there has been slight confusions.
Despite being similar and doing things in also a similar manner, the technologies between them are different in a wide margin. Force Touch and 3D Touch are baked to iOS, making them available almost everywhere on the operating system. Apple users can experience the feature when using apps that are developed to use the feature.
On the other hand, Peek is only for Instagram. Android users can't experience the feature outside Instagram.
The reason for this is because Force Touch and 3D Touch require dedicated hardware to do the job. What Apple did was essentially adding another layer of sensors between the digitizer and the iPhone's taptic engine. This additional layer is the one that determines how much pressure is being applied on the screen.
The information is then fed into the operating system to initiate different tasks based on the pressure input. Different levels of pressure will trigger different actions, like for example "peek" into an element, or "pop" that opens it completely.
The layer added, as well as some other components to make it running, have indeed made pressure-sensitive Apple devices a bit heavier in weight.
Despite Android phones are already able to sense different pressures on its screens, they're still a lot less sophisticated than Apple's. Huawei's highend flagship Mate S smartphone was the one who brought Force Touch to Android, but it was still buggy and a bit less reliable if compared to Apple. This is because Android itself is yet to bring pressure-sensitive feature to its full potential.
For that reason, Peek is slightly less advanced if compared to Apple's Force Touch and 3D Touch. To make it a bit more even, Instagram enhanced it to provide a few more levels of pressure sensitivity.
