Snapchat messages won’t always disappear as fast as they used to

Snap reports earnings on Wednesday for the first time as a public company, and it will have plenty to talk about — including a collection of new product features the company strategically rolled out Tuesday.

The biggest change of the bunch is what Snapchat is calling “limitless Snaps” — essentially letting users send photos and videos that exist longer than the 10-second maximum previously admitted for the app.

Now users can send photos that will remain on their screen until the recipient chooses to dismiss it, at which point the message will be deleted. Users can also send video messages that loop until friends manually dismiss them. Previously, those video messages just played once, though Snapchat already offered users a chance to “replay” a message.

The takeaway here is that Snapchat is continuing to move away from the idea of fleeting and disappearing messages, which is where the app got its start. Yes, messages are still deleted under the new sharing options, but they aren’t deleted as quickly; they offer users more opportunity to see them (or screenshot them) before they disappear for good.

As Snapchat explained in a blog post, “We wanted to give you the option of allowing the recipient to enjoy your Snap as long as they’d like.”

The updates also give Snapchat something to point to tomorrow during the company’s Q1 earnings call. Others — like Facebook and Twitter — have been known to roll out new products just in time for earnings, which helps to give executives something fresh to show off to analysts and investors.

Snapchat

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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