Instagram Video turned out to be quite popular, with users uploading as many as 5 million videos within the first 24 hours of the feature's launch.

Facebook owns Instagram, which until now was a photo-sharing app. Twitter owns Vine, which allows users to share short videos. Facebook and Twitter are always competing with each other, and Facebook just launched Instagram Video to challenge Twitter's Vine.

"Over the past two and a half years, Instagram has become a community where you can capture and share the world's moments simply and beautifully. Some moments, however, need more than a static image to come to life," reads a blog post announcing the new Instagram Video feature. "Until now these stories have been missing from Instagram."

Users apparently embraced the new feature and rushed to try it out. CNET spoke with a company representative and learned that Instagram users posted a whopping 5 million videos in just 24 hours of the feature's availability, with 40 hours of video uploaded per minute at peak times. According to the representative, the peak moment occurred Thursday night, as the Miami Heat won the fight against the San Antonio Spurs during the NBA Finals.

The new Instagram Video service allows users to capture precious moments by shooting and sharing up to 15 seconds of video. The footage is stabilized during upload and users can also use the app's popular effects and filters. Instagram has an impressive user base of 130 million active users who, according to CNET, uploaded enough videos in the first eight hours of the feature's availability that it would take a year to go through all of them.

While Instagram Video seems off to a great start, it remains to be seen whether this trend will continue or it was just initial enthusiasm. Many users may have tried the new feature out of pure curiosity without planning to make a habit of it, while others may truly be happy this option is finally available and will use it constantly. Time will tell. For now, Instagram made a significant jump and seems more successful than Vine was at launch. Instagram Video is available for both iOS and Android. Check out this video to see the new feature in action.