Remember the old days, when you could skim through social media without being accosted by clips of friends' pets and new movie trailers?
Those days are long gone. Twitter today joined the ranks of Facebook and Instagram and launched auto-play videos (click left to see it in action).
Now, native videos, Vines, and even GIFs will begin playback automatically as you scroll past, so you can "keep up with the action without missing a Tweet," Baljeet Singh, product director of Twitter media, wrote in a blog post.
Like its rivals, Twitter videos will be muted in your timeline; tap them to turn on the sound and see a full-screen view. Mobile users can turn their handset sideways into landscape mode to automatically launch those features.
If you get easily distracted, or just want more control over your Twitter feed, visit the Settings page. Users can choose to revert to the previous click-to-play mode, or save data by telling videos to autoplay only when connected to Wi-Fi.
Folks with low bandwidth on their device, meanwhile, can opt out entirely, "to avoid unexpected charges or slow performance," Singh said.
The new function is rolling out now to all users running iOS or twitter.com; the Android version is coming soon. Advertisers looking to autoplay promotional videos can find more information online.
Vine, Instagram, and Facebook all run a similar service, playing videos as soon as they come into view. Last year, Facebook expanded the function by pushing out Premium Video Ads to all users. Its subsidiary Instagram followed suit in the fall with 15-second autoplay ads.