Instagram offers to forget all the questionable content you've watched

How many times have you been browsing around Netflix or YouTube and spotted some intriguing content, but thought twice about clicking on it because you were worried how that interest might end up affecting your recommendations? From Spotify to TikTok, the media that these apps and services surface for us is picked by ever-learning, ever-watchful algorithms. And while they can sometimes seem like they know our tastes better than we do, have you ever wished you could get a fresh start? Luckily for you, Instagram is stepping up with with a new tool that offers what amounts to a big recommendation reset button.

Meta shares news of Instagram’s new recommendation reset option in the context of keeping teens safe and giving them tools to better control their IG experience, but this is one feature that’s absolutely going to find broader appeal. Anyone who’s watched one too many woodworking videos out of curiosity and now finds their recommendations drowning in a sea of dovetail and dado demos knows exactly what we’re talking about.

You can choose to keep the list of accounts you’re following intact, but the app will give you a chance to prune it of unwanted entries when going through the algorithm reset. This is an across-the-board clean slate, affecting Explore, Reels, and your Feed alike. And while that will probably mean dealing with a lot of randomness and less-than-great recommendations initially, it shouldn’t be long before the app starts zeroing in on your tastes once again.

If you want to help give that process a hand, Meta suggests you take full advantage of your ability to mark content in Explore as “Interested,” positively signaling to the algorithm that this kind of thing is your jam. Hopefully that helps keep future recommendations coming right down your alley — until you accidentally spend a full afternoon watching pressure washer videos, anyway.