Instagram is introducing several changes to make the platform safer and more enjoyable for teens, the company said on Tuesday. With social media playing a big part in young people’s lives, Instagram wants to ensure that teens have positive and age-appropriate experiences.

The platform is adding new features and protections that aim to reflect teens’ ever changing interests while also addressing safety concerns.

One of the newest features allows users to reset their recommendations. With this feature, teens can clear the recommended content they see on their explore, reels, and their feed. This means they can start fresh, giving them a clean slate to build recommendations based on what they like in the present.

During this process, teens can also opt to review the accounts that they feel no longer match their interests. This puts teenagers in control of what they see, helping them curate a feed that feels more relevant and enjoyable.

Instagram has partnered with Joanna and Clea, the organisation experts from The Home Edit, to show parents and teens how they can think of organising their Instagram accounts in the same way they might organise their rooms or homes.

For example: as you might declutter your space to make it more comfortable, Instagram suggests reviewing what you’re following to ensure it still aligns with your passions and interests.

“We want to make sure everyone on Instagram – especially teens – has safe, positive, age-appropriate experiences and feels the time they’re spending on Instagram is valuable…. to providing built-in protections from sensitive content with Teen Accounts,” Meta said in the release.

To give people even more control over their experience, Instagram has also introduced several tools that let them manage what appears in their feeds. For example, teens can tap on the three dots in the corner of a recommended post and select “interested” to see more content like that, or “not interested” to remove similar posts from their recommendations.

There’s also a Hidden Words feature, which allows teens to hide posts containing specific words or phrases they don’t want to see.

One can switch to a following feed, which displays posts in chronological order from accounts they follow. This is useful for those users who want to avoid algorithm-driven content. Instagram also offers a favourites feed, where teens can add specific accounts they care about most and see posts from those accounts higher in their feed.

Parents often worry that their children may come across inappropriate content online. To address the same, Instagram now has stricter rules about what teens can see via removing content that violates its guidelines and new features will hide or avoid recommending sensitive content to teens, even if it’s shared by someone they follow.