Quick Answer: What Are Social Media Feed Controls?
Feed controls let viewers tell a platform's recommendation system what they want more or less of, often in their own words. Instagram's Your Algorithm shows people the topics Instagram thinks they like and lets them add or remove topics; Facebook got the same control on October 13, 2026. TikTok has a topic slider, AI keyword filters and a test slider for AI-generated content, YouTube announced prompt-built Custom Feeds in September, and Pinterest lets people see less AI-generated content in some categories. For brands, it means a post has to be easy to place in a topic, and the words in it matter more.
Every platform's feed controls, compared
| Platform | Control | What the viewer can do | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your Algorithm | See the topics Instagram thinks they like; add topics to see more or less of | Launched for Reels in the US in December 2025; now covers the whole app | |
| Your Algorithm | Add and manage topics for Feed and Reels; explain "Interested" or "Not interested" in their own words | Announced October 13, 2026, rolling out | |
| TikTok | Manage Topics | Slide how often 10+ topics, such as Travel or Sports, are recommended; topics are reduced, not removed | Global since June 2025 |
| TikTok | Smart Keyword Filters | Block videos with a keyword, plus synonyms and related words found by AI | Global since June 2025 |
| TikTok | AI-generated content slider | Turn the amount of AI-generated content in the For You feed up or down, inside Manage Topics | In testing since November 2025 |
| YouTube | Custom Feeds | Describe a feed in plain words ("witty podcasts for my 30-minute commute") and save it as a homepage tab | Announced September 23, 2026, "coming soon" |
| GenAI tuner | See fewer AI-generated Pins in categories such as beauty, art, fashion and home decor | Rolling out since October 2025 |
What each platform launched
Instagram and Facebook: Your Algorithm
Instagram's Your Algorithm started on the Reels tab and now applies across the app. It lists the topics Instagram believes a person is interested in, and lets them add topics they want to see and topics they want to avoid. Facebook's version, announced on October 13, 2026 in Meta's newsroom, gives Feed and Reels a dedicated Your Algorithm space reached from the three-dot menu. After someone taps "Interested" or "Not interested," Facebook may ask them to explain what they want in their own words, and Meta says recommendations can adapt within the same session.
Meta describes these controls as an extra signal for its ranking systems, not a replacement for them. Viewing behaviour still does most of the work. What changed, as Instagram's VP of Product Tessa Lyons told CNN, is that AI language models can now understand that kind of written feedback well enough to act on it.
TikTok: Manage Topics and Smart Keyword Filters
TikTok's June 2025 update added two controls. Manage Topics lets people slide how often more than ten broad topics are recommended; it changes how often a topic appears but never removes it. Smart Keyword Filters remove videos containing a keyword the viewer has flagged, and use AI to filter similar words and synonyms as well. TikTok said it would double the keyword limit to 200.
In November 2025 TikTok began testing a third control inside Manage Topics: a slider for how much AI-generated content appears in the For You feed. Like the other topics, it turns AI content up or down rather than removing it, and TikTok was still describing it as a test in March 2026, so not every account has it.
YouTube: Custom Feeds
At Made on YouTube on September 23, 2026, CEO Neal Mohan announced Custom Feeds: viewers describe what they want in a prompt, and YouTube builds a homepage tab that refreshes on its own. Several can be saved. YouTube said the feature is coming "soon."
Pinterest: the GenAI tuner
Pinterest's tuner lets people see less AI-generated content on image Pins in categories that see a lot of it, including beauty, art, fashion and home decor. It sits under "Refine your recommendations" in settings, and in the three-dot menu on a Pin. Pinterest identifies AI content from image metadata and its own classifiers.
YouTube has taken the opposite position. Mohan called separating AI-made from human-made content an "artificial distinction," since many videos combine both. So there is no single industry answer on AI content: Pinterest gives people a filter, TikTok is testing one, and YouTube has declined to build one.
What this changes for brands
Feeds were already sorted by interest rather than by who you follow; we covered that shift in the interest graph. Feed controls add one thing to it: the viewer can now say, in words, which interests count. Three consequences follow.
- Your topic has to be obvious. If a viewer asks for more "small-batch skincare," the system has to recognise your post as small-batch skincare. Posts that wander between topics are harder to place, and harder to place means shown to fewer of the people who asked for exactly that.
- The words you use matter in both directions. On TikTok, a keyword filter also catches synonyms, so a viewer who filters a word can filter you along with it. The same plain-language understanding helps when your caption, on-screen text and spoken words name your topic clearly.
- AI content is filtered by some viewers on some platforms. On Pinterest, a labelled AI image in a beauty, fashion or home decor category can be tuned out by viewers who choose to, and TikTok is testing the same idea for the whole For You feed. Hiding the label is not the answer: Pinterest also detects AI images itself, and other platforms penalise undisclosed AI (see AI disclosure in 2026).
Five changes to make now
- Pick two or three topics and stay in them. Write them down. Each post should be clearly about one of them.
- Name the topic in words, not only pictures. Put it in the first line of the caption, in on-screen text, and in what you say on camera. Language models read all three.
- Write captions for the platform. A keyword that works on Instagram may be one TikTok viewers filter. One caption copied everywhere is the easiest way to get this wrong.
- On Pinterest, think about which images are AI. In beauty, fashion and home decor, real product photography avoids the tuner entirely. Use AI images where they help, label them, and accept that some viewers will see fewer of them.
- Measure reach beyond your followers. Track how many non-followers each post reaches, by topic. If one topic keeps reaching fewer new people, the feed is not placing it where you hoped.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Instagram's Your Algorithm?
A control that shows the topics Instagram thinks you are interested in and lets you add topics you want to see more or less of. It started on Reels and now covers the whole app.
Does Facebook have Your Algorithm?
Yes. Meta announced it for Facebook Feed and Reels on October 13, 2026. It is reached from the three-dot menu and lets people add topics and explain their feedback in their own words.
Can users block AI-generated content on Instagram or TikTok?
Not block, but reduce, on some platforms. Pinterest's tuner reduces AI-generated content in certain categories, and TikTok has been testing an AI-generated content slider in Manage Topics since November 2025. Instagram, Facebook and YouTube have no dedicated AI-content control as of October 2026.
Do feed controls hurt brand reach?
They redistribute it. A brand that is clearly about one topic gains with viewers who asked for that topic and loses with viewers who turned it down. A brand whose posts are hard to place in any topic has the most to lose.
What are YouTube Custom Feeds?
Homepage tabs that viewers build by describing what they want in plain words. YouTube announced them on September 23, 2026 and said they were coming soon.
How do TikTok keyword filters affect brands?
If a viewer filters a keyword, TikTok also filters synonyms and related words it finds with AI. Videos whose captions or text contain those words will not be recommended to that viewer.
The Bottom Line
Every major platform now lets viewers steer their feed in their own words. The posts that gain are the ones a system can place in a topic at a glance. Choose your topics, name them plainly in every post, write each platform's caption separately, and label AI where it applies.
See it work
Autoadify writes a separate caption for each of ten networks from one brief, with 80+ AI models to choose from, and schedules them all from one calendar. Start free.
Ready to automate your social media?
Autoadify gives you access to 80+ AI models, auto-scheduling across 10+ platforms, Shopify sync, and AI agents — all in one platform.
Start free