Instagram saves the best video quality for the most popular content

Image: Kristen Radtke / The Verge

Ever wondered why some of your Instagram videos tend to look blurry, while others are crisp and sharp? It's because, on Instagram, the quality of your video apparently depends on how many views it's getting. That's according to a video AMA from Instagram head Adam Mosseri, in which he explained why some videos are lower-quality than others.

Here's part of Mosseri's explanation, from the video, which was reposted by a Threads user today:

In general, we want to show the highest-quality video we can ... But if something isn't watched for a long time - because the vast majority of views are in the beginning - we will move to a lower quality video. And then if it's watched again a lot then we'll re-render the higher quality video.

He...

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