How to use Snapchat’s new Shared Stories feature

You’ve been able to add your friends as collaborators on Snapchat Stories before (via Custom Stories), but now Snapchat is letting you expand your team of collaborators beyond just your friends.

On Wednesday, Snapchat introduced a new feature called Shared Stories that lets you add friends to a Story and lets those friends add their friends to the Story as well. Snapchat contends that the new feature is a way for users to “build community around the content they love to Snap.” Everyone who joins a Shared Story is allowed to add to that story.

But since the Shared Stories feature may involve sharing your Stories with people you don’t know very well (those friends of friends), Snapchat says that there are included safety measures, such as being notified if a Shared Story you’ve joined includes someone you’ve blocked and content moderation (with automatic language detection and “community review tools”). Shared Story snaps are also deleted after 24 hours. And the Shared Stories feature does not have a chat function.

The Shared Stories feature is available on the Snapchat app right now. Here’s how to find it:

Open the Snapchat mobile app. Select the Profile icon in the top-left corner of your screen. Then, to the right of the My stories header, select the +New story button. From the menu that appears, choose New shared story.

Remember, choosing this option means that whoever joins that Story gets to view it, add to it, and invite their own friends to it. If you’d rather share a Story to just a few friends (without collaboration), select the New private story option instead.

Editors’ Recommendations