STARTING Sunday, Snapchatters will have an easier way to discover and unlock thousands of Lenses built by its global creator community. Since Lens Studio launched in late 2017, creators have submitted over 100,000 unique Lenses through the tool, which have been viewed by Snapchatters over 2.5 billion times.

With the introduction of Lens Explorer, Community Lenses will for the first time be discoverable alongside the main Lens Carousel, offering Snapchatters even more Lenses to play and express themselves with and boosting exposure for Lens creators. To get started in Lens Explorer, just tap the new icon (it’s a smiley face) that appears when the Lens Carousel is active. Tap a Lens tile to unlock a Lens and be taken directly to the Snap Camera or browse through the featured Our Stories. Unlock a Lens by swiping up on Snaps in these Stories.

Lens Explorer will roll out slowly to Snapchatters on iOS only at launch and evolve over time, becoming more personal and increasingly easy to use. In addition to this added discoverability in Lens Explorer, Snapchatters can now also browse for Lenses within Search. aking Community Lenses more prominent within the app is just the latest way Snapchat is excited to be investing in the creator community. Previously announced but ongoing efforts include: Lens Studio Challenges, the Official Lens Creators program, industry outreach, and more.

Since first launching Lenses in 2015, Snapchat has grown to become the world’s most engaged and creative AR platform. Every day, over 70 million Snapchatters play with Lenses, for an average of 3 minutes per day. Snapchat is excited by the loyalty, creativity, and variety of experiences being seen from the Lens Studio community to date and is committed to continuing to invest in the platform, making AR creation accessible to anyone and bring more and more diverse experiences to Snapchatters.

More broadly, the announcement is part of the company's ongoing effort to foster and support a creative and developer community. — SG