Threads Expands Live Chats Translations New Host Tools

Meta’s Threads app is expanding its Live Chats feature with new capabilities that look to improve accessibility, moderation, and audience participation on the social media platform. The tech giant recently announced that Live Chats will now support translations, additional hosting controls, and broader availability to users classified as ‘Community Champions’.

As part of the update, hosts can invite up to three co-hosts to participate in a conversation, allowing them to share moderation responsibilities or contribute as guests. Hosts will also gain the ability to delete messages for all participants, while Threads is testing a visual treatment that makes host messages stand out more prominently within chats.

Meanwhile, translation support is expected to make conversations more accessible to users across different regions and languages. Meta is also extending the ability to start Live Chats to Community Champions, a category of users who maintain active engagement within their communities and have established followings on the platform.

The company said that these new upgrades are based on feedback from creators. Hundreds of Live Chats are being hosted almost every day, attracting thousands of participants, according to Threads. Users can currently share messages, photos, videos, links and emoji reactions, while up to 150 participants can actively engage in a chat at the same time. Additional users can continue following discussions in spectator mode, where they can react to messages and participate in polls.

Threads also revealed that desktop support and pinned messages are in development, both of which have been among the most requested features from creators.

The update comes as Threads continues to expand its social offerings in an effort to strengthen real-time interactions on the platform. Last month, Meta said Threads had crossed 500 million monthly active users, nearly three years after its launch as an alternative to Elon Musk-owned X.

(This article has been curated by Shivani P Menon, who is an intern with The Indian Express)