The best of Instagram in 2013

New Delhi: Instagram, owned by Facebook, is facing increasing competition from the likes of rival apps Snapchat and Vine. The service is gaining momentum by launching new tools, such as videos, and capturing over 152 million users who upload an average total of 65 million photos every day. The photo sharing app recently rolled out of Instagram Direct, a private messaging feature that allows users to share photos with individuals or small groups with in the app. Following the announcement, the service will be even busier in 2014 as Facebook has plans for the photo-sharing app to compete with Snapchat and its 400 million daily “snaps”.Here's a look at some popular posts and hashtags of the year:1. Most liked photo on Instragram: Justin Bieber's “Me and Uncle Will” A picture posted by pop star Justin Bieber with the caption "me and uncle Will," was the Most Liked picture in 2013 on that social network. The phone received almost 1.5million likes. The 19-year-old entertainer, who has 12 millions followers on Instagram, is wearing a simple white T-shirt, gold chain and cap in the photograph as he poses with Smith. Will Smith has his arm around Justin and Will's other hand is making the peace sign.2. The most popular hashtag of 2013: #Love Hashtags have become quite popular in social media. The year's top Instagram hashtag was #love. This year more than 371 million posts on its platform include #love. Other top hashtags include #tbt (throw back Thursday), #girl, #friends, #food and #summer. The other top hashtags from 2013: #tbt (throw back Thursday), #friends, #fashion, #food, and #selfie.3. Top Instagram City: New York City, USA Instagram is more popular in New York than in Los Angeles. The top cities worldwide that follow are Bangkok, Los Angeles, London, Sao Paulo, Moscow, Rio de Janeiro, San Diego, Las Vegas and San Francisco.4. Record usage day: Thanksgivukkah For the first time in more than 100 years Thanksgiving and Hanukkah celebrations overlapped. There were more pictures and videos shared on November 28 than any single day in the platform's history. However, Instagram didn't share specifics on how many photos and videos were uploaded.