Put down the glitter. This app adds sparkles to your Instagrams.
Everything in this world needs, nay deserves, sparkles. Be they in glitter, confetti—or thanks to a viral app—digital form.
Step away from the glitter, people. The kirakira+ app adds actual✨ sparkles✨ to videos as you're taking them. But, while it's great for taking videos of ~objects~, it's not all that marvellous for taking selfies.
The app—which has been around since 2015—went viral during fashion week in London and New York as fashionistas posted their shiny, sparkly creations. Instagram's head of fashion Eva Chen went to town with kirakira+ during London fashion week, which drew many Instagrammers' attention to the app.
Chen's kirakira+ Intagrams prompted something of a craze.
So, how exactly does the app work?
Available for 99p in the App Store, kirakira+ is pretty straightforward to use. Once downloaded, open up the app, swipe the screen to pick a filter, and tap the red button to film something.
I tried out the app to see just how sparkly my world could become. And, there was some good news and bad news. I ventured out of doors to a nearby park to see what could—and could not—become sparkly.
Turns out that pigeons are prime territory for sparkles.
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During my travels, the "color" filter turned the park into a pretty scary-looking place. The "bling bling," "twinkle" and classic "kira kira" filters are the best filters for adding cute sparkles to your view.
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Sadly, there's one thing that kirakira+ isn't great at: selfies. The only way I could get any part of my face to look remotely sparkly was by applying lip gloss and pouting until sparkles appeared on my face. Annoyingly, it seemed to only add sparkles to my lips and—rather bizarrely—my scalp. Which is not exactly the aesthetic I'm trying to achieve on Instagram.
Still, that's not to say you can't go to town on things that aren't closeups of your face—however pretty it may be. You can now turn the most basic and unappealing objects and sights into gloriously sparkling wonders that'll probably blow up your Insta notifications.
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Who doesn't love a sparkle?
Topics Apps & Software Instagram Social Media
Rachel Thompson is the Features Editor at Mashable. Rachel's second non-fiction book The Love Fix: Reclaiming Intimacy in a Disconnected World is out now, published by Penguin Random House in Jan. 2025. The Love Fix explores why dating feels so hard right now, why we experience difficult emotions in the realm of love, and how we can change our dating culture for the better.
A leading sex and dating writer in the UK, Rachel has written for GQ, The Guardian, The Sunday Times Style, The Telegraph, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Stylist, ELLE, The i Paper, Refinery29, and many more.
Rachel's first book Rough: How Violence Has Found Its Way Into the Bedroom And What We Can Do About It, a non-fiction investigation into sexual violence was published by Penguin Random House in 2021.
