Giphy Adds Curated Stories to Desktop, Mobile Web

By Janko Roettgers

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Gif sharing service Giphy is the latest to jump on the Stories bandwagon: The New York-based startup unveiled a new version of its website Monday that incorporates ’s very own take on the popular storytelling format.

At launch, Giphy Stories are limited to curated collections of Gifs selected by the company’s editorial team. On mobile, each of these stories displays as an auto-advancing slide show of Gifs, complete with snarky subtitles.

Alternatively, users can swipe through stories vertically. Visited with a desktop browser, the Gifs of a Story are simply listed subsequently, similar to the way Twitter displays Moments on the web.

Some of the first stories posted on the site include a recap of the “Bachelorette” finale and a collection called ” The best Gifs for your summer out of office email. ”

“We really believe that Giphy Stories can translate today’s pop culture moments into a new and engaging format for entertainment and discovery,” said the company’s director of mobile products Jillian Fisher in a statement. “That conviction informed the decision to prioritize them front on center on Giphy’s new homepage.”

Giphy is just the latest service to incorporate Stories into its products. Originally invented by Snapchat, Stories have since been copied by a number of other apps, including Facebook-owned services like Instagram, Whatsapp and Messenger.

And the format has arguably been working, at least for some of these apps: Instagram Stories are now being viewed by over 400 million people a day , the Facebook subsidiary revealed in June.

For Giphy, adding Stories is also yet another opportunity to build out the company’s nascent advertising business. The company launched an in-house creative agency to work with brands on Gif-based ads earlier this summer.

Giphy plans to bring its Stories format to its mobile apps in the coming weeks, and wants to open up Stories creation tools to partners and artists later in the third quarter of this year.