On the eve of the New Year, Instagram decided to bring the world and its New Year celebration close to each other.

Per reports, Instagram showcased celebrations from around the globe with the help of a New Year's Eve photo stream that could be viewed on mobile devices and desktop browsers. Apart from that, alongside the clean layout that was maintained while compiling different pictures, the desktop version of the stream allowed viewers to quickly hop between a host of time zones and cities to see what's happening at each preferred location as the clock struck 12 midnight.

"We love seeing photos shared from all different parts of the world. As Instagrammers count down to 2013, we wanted to give you a simple way to see how people are celebrating. At instagram.com/nye, you can see photos from every part of the world as the clock strikes midnight in a given time-zone," the official page reads.

"Use the navigation at the bottom to hop from one city to another. You'll be able to see photos from cities like Auckland that are already celebrating, and as the day goes on you'll see photos from everywhere else in the world."

The new changes made by Instagram seemed like the company was targeting more desktop-based audiences than mobile-based ones as when viewing through a mobile browser, users were presented with a much less inspired page that only contained a handful of photos and there was no way to navigate to other time-zones or areas via the mobile version - a feature that seemed flawless on the web.

This, however, is the first big occasion that made full use of the service's recently launched web profiles features. The new feature makes Instagram more accessible to everyone, despite of it being a computing platform and whether or not they have the app installed.

Instagram announced the launch of web profiles back in November 2012, and these were full-fledged Instagram profile pages that users can access from a web browser. The feature seemed to offer each profile with a header image with a user's recent photos, a Follow button, and a grid of user photos organized according to date.

"Additionally, the new layout might suggest that Instagram will use a similar approach to other big events, combating the likes of Twitter for up to the moment social networking," The Verge reports.