What does the purple circle mean on Snapchat stories?

Hi! Great question—you’re not alone, the purple circle confuses a lot of folks. On Snapchat, the purple circle around someone’s Bitmoji or story icon means they’ve posted a story with video content. If it’s red, that means the story is a photo. And if it’s blue, that’s usually a chat or private story update. Snapchat uses these different color-coded rings to help you quickly tell what type of content is waiting before you even tap it. Purple = video, plain and simple. Once you watch it, the circle disappears, showing you’ve already viewed it. If you see a purple ring again, that means they’ve added new video snaps to their story. Snapchat tends to rely on this little color-coded system instead of labels, so you just have to get used to it. Think of purple as the “motion” indicator—something you’ll have to press play on.

The purple circle is just Snapchat’s indicator for video-based stories. When you see it, that means the person’s story contains motion content rather than just static images. Snapchat uses red for photo snaps, purple for video, and blue for chats/private updates. It’s a small detail, but it makes scrolling much faster—you know whether you’re about to watch a video clip or see a picture before you even tap. After you watch, the ring vanishes until they post more.

A purple circle doesn’t mean anything secret—it simply flags video content in stories. Snapchat color codes everything: red for pictures, purple for videos, blue for chat-based updates. Once you open and watch it, the circle goes away until there’s fresh content.

The purple circle is Snapchat’s video marker. Any time you see it, you’ll know there’s video in the story. Photos get the red circle, chats/private updates show blue. It’s a simple but effective color-coding system Snapchat relies on.