Facebook is testing a new "self-destructing" post feature which allows users to set how long they want posts to be live before they disappear.
The move is reminiscent of Snapchat, a picture-sharing site well-loved for its self-destruction feature and the "now you see it, now you don't" aspect.
"We're running a small pilot of a feature on Facebook for iOS that lets people schedule deletion of their posts in advance," said a spokesperson for the social media giant.
According to screenshots of the new feature shared on Twitter, Facebook will give users a range of self-termination times, from 1 hour to 7 days.
Facebook often tests new features with a small pool of people to determine the usefulness of a feature and to see how many people will actually take advantage of it. It also allows the company to get feedback about new features and how they can be improved.
Facebook has had multiple attempts at trying to take down Snapchat. It is even rumored that the social media company attempted to buy Snapchat for $3 billion. Rumors of this purchase started back at the end of 2013, and the company has arguably been trying to take it down since.
Its latest attempt was with a standalone-messaging app called Slingshot. With this app, Facebook aimed to "build something where everybody is a creator, and nobody is just a spectator. When everyone participates, there's less pressure, more creativity and even the little things in life can turn into awesome shared experiences."
After the failure of Slingshot, Facebook's Instagram unveiled a feature that allowed users to send photos to others, after which the photos are deleted.
It is important for users to remember that deleting a post from an account will not necessarily remove the post from the company's servers. Posts may not be deleted from Facebook's offline backups for up to 90 days.
Information about the feature will likely be released in the coming months, and it is of course possible that the feature will receive a much more wide-scale release sometime in the future. In the meantime, select Facebook users on iOS may be able to experience the feature for themselves.
Despite this, the company has added a portion under its question and answer section for the feature, suggesting that it may stay. Under the question "how do I post something and set it to expire?" the company simply says "setting posts to expire is only available in some areas right now."
