After years of excuses, Instagram is finally available on the iPad.

In what may be the most highly anticipated app ever for the Apple tablet, Meta on Wednesday released a dedicated Instagram app for the iPad. The long-awaited app now available for download in the App Store takes full advantage of the larger screen.

When you open the iPad app, you’ll go straight to Reels without having to navigate to a separate tab. Comments will also be easier to view while watching Reels.

In addition, Instagram is launching a dedicated “following” tab which lets you choose which content you want to view – from friends, all the accounts you follow or just the latest with most recent posts first.

“It’s the Instagram you love, now with more space to play,” Instagram said in a blog post.

Instagram's iPad app debut: What took so long?

A bigger screen could reel in more users and engagement as Instagram competes with archrival TikTok for attention and ad dollars. So what took so long?

Despite pleas from frustrated Apple tablet users relegated to viewing Reels and images on the iPhone app with its smaller and narrower display or on a clunky Web browser, the marriage comes 15 years after Instagram and the iPad debuted.

The Facebook app has been on the iPad since 2011. Even WhatsApp finally got an iPad app earlier this year.

In explaining the oversight for such a highly visual social media app, Meta claimed limited resources and higher priorities.

In 2022, Instagram boss Adam Mosseri said that not enough people wanted a native Instagram app for Apple’s tablet even though he admitted it was a popular request.

“We get this one a lot,” Mosseri said. “It’s still just not a big enough group of people to be a priority. Hoping to get to it at some point, but right now we’re very heads down on other things.”

A year later, he said: “I think it’s a good thing to do at some point. But we have only so many people working at Instagram, so we’ve got to pick the most important things to do to improve Instagram at any given moment.”

In a statement, Instagram said it decided to prioritize mobile over the iPad as that's the way that most people use Instagram.

"We know people have been asking for an iPad app and we’re excited that we’re now able to build it in a way that truly aligns with how our community uses Instagram," the statement said.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Insta joy? Apple iPad finally gets Instagram app

Reporting by Jessica Guynn, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect