Giphy is launching its own take on stories with curated GIFs throughout the day

We’ve been unable to escape the prolific spread of Snapchat Stories since last year, seeing it superseded by Instagram and copied by everything from WhatsApp to even real estate websites. Now Giphy is announcing that it’s refreshing its homepage to prominently feature Stories, which will be curated by an editorial team. Stories will be centered around the day’s trending subjects, told through GIFs. One story will be published every hour, curated by categories of Entertainment, Sports, and Reactions.

Despite the obvious connection to Instagram Stories in its name, Giphy Stories are a little more like a cross between a Twitter Moment and Snapchat’s Discover content. There’s episode recaps like “The Bachelorette Finale in GIFs” which are reminiscent of Tumblr GIF sets, and reaction packs like “The best GIFs for your summer out of office email” which read like a Buzzfeed listicle in GIF form. Stories will be available on desktop and mobile.

Giphy

It’s an interesting move for Giphy as it shifts from a GIF database site to one that takes more of an editorial role. Giphy is also opening up Stories to Partners & Artists later this year, and they’ll be able to create and distribute their own curated stories.