Instagram’s New Restyle AI Tool: A Revolution in Photo Editing

Restyle Launch: On October 23, 2025, Instagram launched the innovative Restyle feature within Stories, powered by advanced Meta AI technology. This tool enables users to completely edit and reimagine photos and videos, allowing them to add, remove, or modify any element in uploaded content, either through predefined styles or using custom text prompts.

Instagram’s New Restyle Tool Usage Guide:

Usage Steps: To use the Restyle feature, open the Instagram app, then tap the plus (+) icon on your profile picture to start creating a new Story. Choose the photo or video you want to edit from your device’s gallery. On the Story editing screen, you will find the Restyle icon, which looks like a paintbrush, in the upper right corner. After that, you can choose to "Add", "Remove", or "Change" specific elements, or apply one of the available preset styles.

Completing Edits: Once you’ve selected the desired style or written your custom description, tap the "Done" button. The result will appear in a few seconds. If you're not satisfied, you can tap the reload icon to try other options, or press "Undo" to revert to the original version. Once you achieve the perfect result, tap "Done" again, and you can then publish your Story. Additionally, "Add Yours" stickers are available as an option to engage your friends in this creative trend. For videos, the usage steps are similar, with ready-made effects such as "Underwater", "Snowstorm", or "Fire and flames" to choose from.

Practical Examples of Applying Restyle on Instagram:

Practical Application: For example, a user can upload a photo of their pet, like their dog, wearing a scarf. Using the Restyle tool, they can easily "remove the scarf" and then request to "add a superhero costume" for the dog. This tool produces highly fun and creative results. After that, the user can further modify by requesting to "change the superhero logo" to reflect a space and dogs theme or "change the background" to a towering skyscraper.

The Importance of the Restyle Tool and its Competitive Impact in the AI Market:

Importance of Restyle: The importance of this feature transcends mere entertainment filters; it represents a primary gateway to attract new users to AI tools. Many users may not proactively download dedicated standalone applications, but they regularly engage in media sharing via Instagram, making Restyle a seamless and accessible experience for them.

Competition: Instagram faces strong competition in the field of AI-powered photo editing tools, including Google Photos, which offers editing capabilities using text prompts, and xAI, which supports Grok tools on the X platform (formerly Twitter). Meta had previously employed AI tools in its standalone Meta AI application. However, integrating Restyle directly into Stories is a strategic move that ensures this technology and its experience reach a much larger number of users.

Challenges and Spread: "Add Yours" stickers, when used with AI-edited photos, aim to accelerate the spread of content enhanced by Artificial Intelligence and the underlying tools. Since the Restyle tool relies on uploaded photos or videos in addition to text prompts, users depend on Meta models to achieve their creative vision. However, as with any AI-powered tool, some flaws may occasionally appear, or unintentional trademark infringement might occur. Although the results may not reach the level of hand-drawn or manually designed artworks, it is expected that a large number of users will try the available options, at least out of curiosity to see how their photos or pet pictures will look as creative characters.