Because why not? It seems like every software that has social elements built-in is getting stories nowadays. And OneDrive is in no mood to get left behind in this craze.
Microsoft has announced that the cloud storage service is getting stories very soon.
This feature will be called photo stories and allow you to share photos and videos you host on the service with family and friends. They will be able to interact with your content via reacts and comments.
Of course, this is not a new concept for Microsoft. The company recently announced a feature for the Xbox app that lets you share gameplay moments with those in your gaming circle.
On OneDrive, you will also be able to customize a photo story by changing your Microsoft Account name and picture. You can also set a cover photo and description for your story.
Once you share a story, it will appear in the Shared tab on your followers’ OneDrive.
Obviously, several privacy-focused features will be built right from the start. You will have the option of removing access for people or even deleting photo stories via dedicated options. It looks like Redmond wants to fully cook this feature before making it available to users.
Another important point here is that these stories are designed to be private and will not appear in search engines.
OneDrive photos stories do not take up extra space, as you would imagine. That’s because you can only share images and clips that are stored on OneDrive. That said, if you delete a photo used in a story, a copy will remain in the cloud and count towards your storage usage.
Microsoft touts the lack of ads as a major selling point for this new feature, and the company also highlights that you don’t need to have a premium subscription in order to use it.
Photo stories are currently supported on the following plans: The free OneDrive Basic with 5 GB of storage, OneDrive Standalone 100 GB, Microsoft 365 Personal, and Microsoft 365 Family.
Work and school accounts are not supported right now.
The software titan has made this new feature available as a public preview in Australia only for the time being. It will arrive in the US and other countries later this year. What we don’t have right now is a timeline for general availability.
Should be soon.
