Facebook has teamed up with key publishers to launch Instant Articles, a new feature that makes reading news articles faster on the Facebook app.

Read all about it

Facebook announced the news in a blog post. 

" People share a lot of articles on Facebook, particularly on our mobile app. To date, however, these stories take an average of eight seconds to load, by far the slowest single content type on Facebook.

"Instant Articles makes the reading experience as much as ten times faster than standard mobile web articles," Facebook explained.

Lock and load

Facebook has partnered with publishers including The New York Times and BuzzFeed to deliver the new content. As a sweetener, Facebook says publishers will be able to sell ads in their articles and pocket the revenue.

Aside from faster load times, Instant Articles also features a suite of interactive features including the ability to zoom and explore high-res photos by tilting your phone.

Users can also view auto-play videos, interactive maps, listen to audio clips, and comment on articles.

Game changer?

While Twitter has traditionally dominated the breaking news space, Instant Articles is an unambiguous sign of Facebook's intentions in the space.

However how publishers will react to being beholden to Facebook for distribution remains to be seen.

Instant Articles in now available on Facebook's iOS app, with Android coming shortly.

To find out more visit media.fb.com.