Facebook replacing 'likes' with 'views' as primary content performance metric
16 Nov 2024

Facebook is moving to "views" as its primary metric for assessing content performance, just like Instagram's metrics.

The change will not just be for videos but also for images and text posts.

The shift was first announced by Instagram head Adam Mosseri in August, highlighting that a single metric across platforms would make it easier for creators to understand their content's performance.

How are 'views' calculated?
Metric definition

For Reels, a view is defined as the number of times a video has been played. For all other content types, a view is counted every time a piece of content appears on a user's screen.

If the same user views it multiple times, each instance is counted as a separate view.

This new approach is aimed at giving creators more transparency into their content's performance.

Meta extends 'views' metric to Threads posts
Expansion

Meta has also extended the view count feature to posts on Threads.

However, the metric may not be as informative for the average user. It can tell you how many screens a post has appeared on, but not why it has done so.

The latest change is part of Meta's broader strategy to keep users engaged and scrolling through content.