Hike Messenger now enables sharing of 'video stories'

Users can share videos of up to 20 seconds, and even use 'live filters'.

India's homegrown messaging platform Hike Messenger, has announced the launch of a 'video stories' feature. Users can share videos of up to 20 seconds on the tab called 'Stories'. These can be can be made more dramatic with the use of the newly introduced live filters automatically detect, and recognize a user's face using machine learning and help people have more fun while storytelling.

Both video and photo stories on Hike vanish after 48 hours, making way for users to tell their new day's stories. They can be posted on Hike Stories, or can even be shared directly with friends. Users can see how many people and who viewed their story.

As of January 2016, Hike claims to have over 100 million users, and that 95% of its users are based in India, with 90% of them below the age of 30. Hike users, says the company, exchange 40 billion messages per month and spend 120 min. per user per week on the platform, on an average.

With this launch, Hike also announced that it is starting a new digital campaign called 'Love, Masti, Dosti'.