If you're not a fan of Facebook's auto-playing videos, get ready to be annoyed. Starting today, videos will auto-play with the sound enabled by default. If you don't have your phone set on silent, every time you scroll past an auto-playing video, you'll now hear the audio associated with it.
Facebook says that it introduced the change after receiving "positive feedback" from a beta test conducted last year:
Videos in News Feed have previously played silently — you tap on a video to hear sound. As people watch more video on phones, they've come to expect sound when the volume on their device is turned on. After testing sound on in News Feed and hearing positive feedback, we're slowly bringing it to more people. With this update, sound fades in and out as you scroll through videos in News Feed, bringing those videos to life.
Although videos will now play with the sound enabled, you'll be able to turn it off via settings:
If your phone is set to silent, videos will not play with sound. If you never want videos to play with sound, you can disable this feature by switching off "Videos in News Feed Start With Sound" in Settings. We'll also be showing in-product messages to tell people about the new sound on experience and controls.
You can now minimize a video and scroll through your News Feed, with the video continuing to play in the corner of your screen. Facebook is also making changes to the way vertical videos look on Android and iOS, including larger previews. Finally, Facebook's video app will make its debut on Amazon Fire TV, Samsung's smart TVs, and Apple TV.
