Instagram's Story Stickers Let You Tag Location, Time, & Temp

Instagram Story-tellers of America, your Stories just got way more fun: On Dec. 20, 2016, Instagram announced the launch of Instagram stickers on Stories. These stickers will allow you to add contextual info like the time, weather, and geotag locations to your Stories, along with emoji and seasonal stickers. So if you’ve ever created a Story and thought, “This is awesome, but what it really needs is a cartoon Christmas sweater,” then today is your very best day.

Instagram Stories have gotten some major upgrades since they first launched back in August 2016. The feature, which lets Instagrammers create slideshows of images and short videos that disappear after 24 hours (think Snapchat stories), got a boost with the addition of Boomerang, mentions, and links back in early November. Later that month, Stories also announced that it would be adding a live video feature. Put those updates together with these new stickers, and you’ve got an Instagram Stories platform that is as tricked out as a dubstep-themed Christmas display.

The new update lets you add stickers with info about where you are, the temperature, and the time, and you can choose between multiple sticker styles to suit your taste. During the holidays, you can also choose from an assortment of festive stickers, including a Christmas sweater, mistletoe, a Christmas tree, a snowman, and a menorah. And if you really want to go wild, you can use the new candy cane brush, which lets you make candy cane borders and shapes to your heart’s content. Of course, these stickers change depending on the season and holiday coming up.

Adding stickers to your Stories is simple. Here’s how you do it:

1. Make Sure You Have The Update

Often these updates install automatically, but if you don’t have the stickers feature, check if you have an update available. Go to the App Store, select “Updates” in the lower right corner, and see if you have anything from Instagram waiting for you.

2. Start Your Story & Tap On The Smiley Icon

To get to the Stories feature to begin with, click on your profile bubble that says "My Story" at the top of your home page. Alternatively, you can visit your profile and click on your profile picture. Once you snap a photo or record a video, you'll see a square smiley face icon at the top right of your screen. Click it for sticker options.

3. Select Your Stickers

You'll see sticker options like Location, Mention, #Hashtag, the current time, temperature, and much more. If you search on a Friday, for example, you might see a bunch of TGIF stickers pop up. And starting in 2018, Instagram even started letting users add GIFs from Giphy. The options are truly endless.

4. Perfect Your Sticker Game

You're not done until you customize your Instagram Story stickers. To get a different visual style for a time, temperature, or location, just tap it, and you’ll see different options. You can also use your fingers to enlarge or tilt the stickers however you’d like. I suggest putting yourself, and everyone, in Christmas sweaters. If you want to get rid of a sticker, simply press down and drag it to the little trash can that pops up at the bottom of the screen.

And there you have it, friends. Now go out and sticker the world!