Summer’s second long weekend is here, which means your Snapchat activity might increase over the next few days.
Here are some tips and tricks to make snapping and viewing more fun. (Snapchat also recently revamped its support site to make it easier to find answers to your questions.)
1. Use multiple filters
That’s right — you can put a time stamp, color, geofilter, AND video filter all on the same snap. Keep one finger on the screen as you use another to swipe left and right to add filters. Lift finger up between choosing, and make sure that filters’ locations don’t overlap.
2. Get more pen colors
If you tap on the color bar then drag your finger around the screen, you’ll get access to a huge range of colors.
3. Create your own geofilter
You can make your own geofilter using a transparent PNG file with a 1080 x 1920 pixel dimension and under 300 KB file size. Businesses have to create theirs through a separate paid On Demand Geofilter tool.
4. Save data by turning on Travel Mode in settings
The feature prevents stories from auto-loading when you’re not on WiFi.
5. Customize friend emojis
If you’ve ever been confused about what those emojis mean next to a friend’s username, go into your Settings and Additional Services. Once there, go into the Friend Emojis screen to see what each one represents and change them too.
Oh, and if you’ve ever wondered what the flame emoji and the hourglass emoji next to a name mean — it indicates your Snapstreak. Translation: The flame shows up when you and your friend have been snapping with each other for more than one consecutive day at a time. The hourglass tells you that streak will end soon.
6. Put a soundtrack on snaps
Play songs in a separate app and turn the volume up. Then record a video snap.
7. Tag a sticker to a moving object in a snap
Tap a sticker and hold it on top of an object until the sticker is pinned. When your video plays, the sticker will follow the object’s movement.
8. Change size of stickers and text
Pinch stickers and text to make them bigger or smaller. You can rotate them too.
9. Subscribe to channels
If you like a certain news outlet, you can tap and hold a story to subscribe to it. When you do, the channel will show up under the Subscriptions section, under your friends’ stories.
10. Add friends who are nearby
This is an easy way to add a bunch of people during a party. Turn on location tracking to see which user names are nearby in the Add Friends feature.
11. Stop someone else from seeing your stories
In Settings, go to the Who Can section and choose Custom for My Story. Then you’ll be able to block people without actually blocking them or unfriending them.
If you don’t want to watch someone else’s story — swipe down on it. To avoid seeing stories from that person completely, unfriend.
12. How to tell who has viewed your story
Tap on your story and swipe up from the bottom to see who has viewed or took a screenshot of your image. You can also delete individual stories this way.
BONUS TIPS!
You can send friends money. Type in an amount (with the dollar sign in front) into a chat window. Then a secret, green Add Cash button appears where you can then link your credit card information.
Get directions. If you type in an address, Snapchat will give you the option to load it into Google Maps so you don’t have to type it in again.
