Friends’ Day: Facebook introduces Friends Awards, personalised video, and more

Facebook is celebrating 'Friends' Day' with a set of new features for its users on the social networking platform.

The social networking giant has introduced Friends Awards which will be visible at the top of your news feed just below the personalised Friends Day video by Facebook. There are already a set of awards along with the winners for different categories. If the feature doesn't appear on your News Feed, you can participate in the Friends' Day experience and view stories by clicking here.

Some of them include the best liker, the one with whom you share the most number of mutual friends, the one who always wishes you on your birthday, and the one whose posts you've liked the most. These awards are titled as 'Bestie', 'Great Listener', and 'Knows How To Make Me Laugh'.

Among the awards to choose from, there are some titled 'Makes Any Time A Good Time's, 'Always Has My Back', 'Big Hearted'. You can also add a photo of your choice for the friend you're giving the award to.

Facebook also has three new camera filters dedicated to celebrate Friends Day. You will find the camera icon on the top left corner of the news feed on mobile and desktop. Facebook has also incorporated it's Live video feature.

A special live series with the hashtag #LiveWithFriends will be available for users to watch on Facebook. You can use this hashtag to join in on the Facebook Live series.

Facebook has also shared highlights on the virtual friendships experienced on the social media platform. In comparison to 2016, there were two times more posts about 'friendships' in 2017.

Facebook says that among the activities people shared on the platform, celebrating friendships and birthdays topped over others like sharing a meal or watching TV shows. Facebook's activity feature is available on its new post section. Here you can choose an activity that you're doing like eating, sleeping, reading, and more.

An interesting statistic Facebook has shared is categorising countries as the different types of friends based on data collected throughout 2017.

India is the extrovert as it made the most number of friends. Mexico is the most loveable with the most love reactions, and Philippines is the connector with the most number of groups created. Brazil is the camera-ready friend with the most tagged photos, while the US has foodie friends with most eating activity users. No surprise there.

Facebook also says that it witnessed an average of 750 million 'friendships' formed every day. Also, there were over 600 million Friendversary videos shared in 2017. It's always fun to see these cute Friendversary videos pop up on your news feed and remind you of the sweet virtual times.