Pinterest is one of my most used social media sites. While I love the buzz of TikTok, the inspiration I find on Instagram, and the opportunities for learning on LinkedIn, I often need to take breaks from the major platforms. But never Pinterest. No matter where I'm at in my life, there's always something I need from the visual search engine.

I’ll often hop onto the app or website with a specific query in mind — “living room decor,” “capsule wardrobe,” and “productivity tools” are some of my most recent searches. As you’ll have guessed from those examples, I usually open up the Pinterest app with one of three goals: 

• Find inspiration
• Figure out how to do something
• Buy something

And I’m not unique in this, either — according to data from Pinterest, more than 85% of users have made a purchase based on pins from brands. 

Pinterest boasts 619 million global active users, making it one of the most popular social networking platforms in the world. But it’s how those Pinterest lovers use the app that’s worth paying attention to. According to a 2024 report by DataReportal, 36.6% of active users are on the app to follow or research brands and products, making it the main reason they use Pinterest. 

So, if you’re a business or a creator looking to monetize, using Pinterest as part of your marketing efforts is well worth exploring. 

Convinced yet? Good — because learning to use Pinterest is straightforward, even if you've never opened the app. In short: to use Pinterest, you create an account, build themed boards, save the ideas you find (or make) as pins, and — if you're a creator or business — optimize those pins with keywords so they show up when people search.

Below, I'll walk you through setting up your account, creating pins and boards, growing an audience, and measuring what's working.

Key takeaways

• Pinterest has 619 million active users, and 85% of them have made a purchase based on pins from brands.
• 36.6% of active Pinterest users are there to research brands and products — more than YouTube, X, or LinkedIn.
• Business accounts unlock analytics, advertising, product catalogs, and the business/creator hub — switch from personal if you're marketing, selling, or creating.
• Pinterest is a long-game platform — a pin can keep getting attention and driving traffic for months or years after it's published.
• The ideal pin is vertical — 2:3 aspect ratio at 600 x 900 pixels — with a strong keyword in the title, a clear call to action in the description, and a link back to the source.
• Pinterest's best-performing niches include home decor, beauty, wellness, fashion, food, DIY and crafts, parenting, weddings, travel, and education.
• Focus Pinterest analytics on four metrics — impressions, pin clicks, saves, and outbound clicks.
• Plan for trends around early — Pinterest users come to the app well before the season, holiday, or event they're planning for.

What is Pinterest?

Pinterest is a visual discovery engine — a social media platform that works like a virtual pinboard, where users save and organize ideas as visual cards (pins) on collections (boards). Pinterest describes itself as "a visual discovery engine for finding ideas like recipes, home and style inspiration, and more."

Brands, creators, and private users can create pins by uploading an image or video from their devices. Each pin can have its own title and description and a website link (important for brands and creators looking to drive traffic elsewhere). Users can also save pins of images they find online with Pinterest's browser extension.

All Pinterest users, whether they have a business or personal account, have a profile where others can see their Pinterest boards and pins (unless they choose to make a board private).

Beyond the mechanics, I love this definition Pinterest marketing expert and agency owner Heather Farris shared with Buffer: “If Google Images and Instagram were to have a baby, you’d land on Pinterest.”    

Before we get into strategy, let’s cover a few key terms.

Pinterest terms to know before you start

Before diving in, a quick glossary — you'll hear these terms across the rest of the guide:

• Pin — an image or video saved to Pinterest, usually with a title, description, and destination link.
• Board — a themed collection of pins (e.g., "Small kitchen inspo," "Q2 product launches").
• Pinboard — another word for a board; Pinterest uses it interchangeably.
• Rich pin — a pin that automatically pulls extra info from the linked website (used for recipes, products, and articles).
• Idea pin — a multi-page pin format designed for step-by-step content and stories.
• Save — when a user adds a pin to one of their boards.
• Repin — saving someone else's pin to your own board.
• Home feed — the personalized feed of pins Pinterest shows when you open the app.
• Pinterest Analytics — the native dashboard (business accounts only) with reach, engagement, and click data.
• Pinterest Trends — Pinterest's free tool for seeing what's gaining search momentum on the platform.

The benefits of Pinterest for businesses and creators

Like other social media platforms, Pinterest can be a powerful marketing tool for reaching new followers. It can help:

• Increase brand awareness
• Drive website traffic
• Increase sales and conversions 

Heather says Pinterest is like a search engine that drives new customers to businesses and creators. “It has allowed them to thrive,” she says. “Pinterest users are different from others because they have a higher intent to purchase and often spend more money per purchase.”

“Pinners are also planners, so they are very meticulous about how they use this platform, carefully organizing their Pinterest pins into curated boards they can refer back to later,” she adds.

Another point in Pinterest’s favor: because of how the algorithm (content ranking) on Pinterest works, users don’t have to follow you to discover your content, nor do your pins have to be very new for them to be recommended. “They can simply search for something, and if you’ve done your research and optimizations correctly, you have the chance to show up right when they search for you,” Heather says.

Unlike other social media sites, older content, if well-optimized, isn’t immediately excluded — that’s not how Pinterest works. This means your pins could continue gaining traction months or even years after you first publish them. “Pinterest will send you traffic for the long run,” Heather says. “I have personally made pins for my brands that, five, six, or seven years later, are still bringing people to my website.”

Who uses Pinterest? (And which niches perform best)

Pinterest tends to perform best for businesses and creators in visual, aspirational, or how-to niches. Heather says Pinterest is a must if you work in one of the categories below. "I have worked with brands across all these categories, and they have all seen success in some form or another."

• Home decor/interior design
• Beauty
• Wellness
• Fashion 
• Children’s activities
• Parenting
• Design 
• DIY and crafts
• Food
• Gardening
• Health
• Mindset
• Wedding
• Travel
• Education

Pinterest personal vs. business account: which one do you need?

Pinterest offers both personal and business (professional) accounts. There are some key differences between the two.

“Personal and business accounts on Pinterest are similar, but business accounts include features that are helpful to business owners and marketers,” the platform says.  Here's what each account type gives you:

A personal Pinterest account is great if you’re just using it to save ideas for later. If you’re using Pinterest as a creator, business, or marketer, a Pinterest business account is your best bet. 

Good news if you’re just exploring the platform or already have a personal account: you can switch to a business account or connect a business account to your existing personal profile.

How to create a Pinterest personal account

Here’s how to create a Pinterest personal account from scratch:

• Navigate to Pinterest.com.
• From the top-right of your screen, click Sign up.
• Enter your email and date of birth and create a password.
• Click Continue.
• Follow the prompts to enter your personal details.
• Click on the relevant tiles to choose your interests, then Continue to your feed.
• Start exploring pinning. The more you pin, the better the recommendations on your home feed will be. 

How to create a Pinterest business account

To create a new business account not tied to a personal account:

• Navigate to Pinterest.com.
• From the top-right of your screen, click Sign up.
• At the bottom of the pop-up, click Create a business account.
• Enter your email, create a password, and enter your date of birth.
• Click Create account.
• Follow the prompts to fill out your profile.
• Choose what you’d like to do first (create a pin, create an ad, or build your profile), and click Next.

How to create a pin

There are a few ways to create a pin — I'll walk you through all of them. (We'll cover boards in the next section; you can create pins first and organize them later, or build your boards first and pin into them. Totally up to you.)

On your computer

• Log in to Pinterest.com.
• If you have a personal profile, choose Create on the top left of your screen.
• If you have a business account, click the hamburger menu (three lines) on the top left, then Create Pin.

• Drag and drop an image or video from your computer or click the arrow icon to open your folders. You can also choose the Save from URL button under the image upload icon to grab an image or video from a web page. 

• Here, you can add information about your pin, like a title, description, related topics, the board you want to save it to, and a website link. Choose More options to turn comments and shopping recommendations on or off. 
• When you’re ready, click Publish.

On your mobile device

• Open the Pinterest app.
• Click the + button at the bottom of the app.
• Choose Pin.
• Select a photo or a video from your gallery and hit Next.
• Add a title, description, and link (optional).
• Choose a board to post on, add relevant tags, choose when you want to post, and hit Create.

Pinterest Save extension

One of the easiest ways to pin content to your boards from around the web is to pin it with the Pinterest Save extension or browser button. Here’s how to install and use it:

• Go to Pinterest’s Save extension page here and choose where to use the button (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Microsoft Edge).
• Navigate to the appropriate browser store and follow the prompts.
• Once installed, the Pinterest save icon will appear whenever you hover over an image on a website. Click on it to pin an image, then choose or create a board to save it to. 
• Click View on the pop-up that appears to edit the image title, description, and more. 

Create a pin with Buffer

The handy thing about scheduling a pin with Buffer is that you can cross-post it to other platforms in the same flow — so if you're already planning an Instagram post, you can send it to Pinterest, TikTok, or Facebook without reopening a new tab.

You can schedule the pin to automatically publish at a specific time or share immediately. To start pinning with Buffer:

• Make sure you’re logged into the Pinterest account you want to connect.
• Sign up or log in to Buffer. Click the +New button on the top left and click on Connect a New Channel.
• Scroll down and click on Pinterest. Click Give access. Congrats, your Pinterest account is all set up.
• Click the + New Post button and choose Pinterest.
• Upload your image or video with a title and destination link (optional).
• Select the board/s you want to save your new pin to. 

• Click Schedule Post button to set a specific publishing date and time, choose Next Available, or click the dropdown arrow for more options.
• If you want to cross-post this image or video to your other social media channels, click on the appropriate icons at the top of the window.

How to create a board

A well-organized Pinterest profile is one way to optimize your profile (more on this below) and make it more appealing to your target audience.

Create a board on desktop

• Log in to Pinterest.com.
• If you have a personal profile, choose Create on the top left of your screen.
• If you have a business account, click the hamburger menu (three lines) on the top left, then Create Board.
• Choose a name for your board, add collaborators, and toggle Make this board secret on to create a private board.

Create a board using the Pinterest mobile app

• Click the + button at the bottom of the app.
• Choose Board.
• Choose a name for your board, add collaborators, and toggle Make this board secret on to create a private board.
• Add suggested pins to your board (you can choose to add these later, too).

Your board is created, but you're not done yet (don't miss this step if you're a small business or creator). Choose the three dots to the top right of your new board, then Edit board. Here, you can edit each board's individual settings, including name, description, board cover, and more.

Tips for creating a Pinterest board

• Choose an eye-catching board cover image
• Add a description that features important keywords in your niche

Filling out these details for each board will help with SEO (search engine optimization) and provide users with additional context about your account content.

How to use Pinterest for business and creators: 13 tactics that work

You’ve created a new business account and started creating pins and boards, but there’s a whole lot more to using Pinterest for business. Be sure to include the tactics below in your social media marketing strategy for Pinterest to grow your following. 

Optimize your profile

Completing your profile is a key step in ensuring that your account is discoverable and looks appealing to users on Pinterest.

Find your audience

Like many other social media networks, focusing on a niche group of highly engaged users will produce better results than targeting a broad, unspecified audience.

If you focus on sharing consistent content within your niche, people will start to look to you as a continual source of inspiration and information. Focusing on a niche audience will also produce favorable results within the Pinterest algorithm.

Use eye-catching, uncluttered images

Pinterest is a visual-first platform, so a good image can make all the difference in maximising results. I'll scroll right past a fuzzy stock photo — and so will your audience. Images that stand out, are colourful and unique, and say something specific about what you offer will give you a significant edge compared to other content on the platform.

You'll also want to steer clear of cluttered images. Many Pinterest users will be viewing your pins on the app, so make sure the message is easy to digest (and that text is legible in the desktop feed and on smaller, mobile formats).

Don’t forget about video

Video content on Pinterest can be an incredible way to bring your ideas to life. They’ll also auto-play and stand out in users’ feeds.

Our research showed that videos get more engagement on Pinterest than images, so consider testing a few video pins on your account.

Pinterest video tips

• To use up as much screen space as possible, ensure your videos are designed for mobile and exported in either square or portrait format.
• Shorter videos work best when you want users to discover you (if your goal is awareness or storytelling).
• Go longer when you want people to do something with your idea — great for education or tutorials.

Use a vertical aspect ratio

Pins in the home and search feed are organized into columns, so vertical images take up more space and stand out more in the feed. Recommended Pinterest image specs:

• Vertical pin (recommended): 2:3 ratio, 600 x 900 pixels
• Square pin: 1:1 ratio, 600 x 600 pixels

Consider adding a little copy

If your image doesn’t give enough context, add text to the image to help land your message. But try to keep the copy simple and not clutter the overall image. 

Provide helpful, detailed pin descriptions

Pins with descriptions drive more clicks to your site than those without. If your objective is to drive clicks, use the description to hint that there's more to see on your website — don't give everything away on Pinterest, just enough to pique a user's curiosity.

A strong call to action (CTA) — like "shop," "make," "find," or "buy" — will encourage people to take the next step.

Pinterest SEO: Use well-researched keywords

Leaning on keywords is a vital part of any good Pinterest strategy. “You cannot overlook keywords on Pinterest if you want to create a sustainable long-term Pinterest presence,” Heather says. 

Consider users’ search intent when they are looking for Pinterest content like yours. What are they likely to be looking for? What words and phrases are they typing into the search bar?

Pinterest's search function can help you find new keywords if you’re stuck. For example, if your pin is a roast chicken recipe, search for “roast chicken” on Pinterest. You’ll see suggested searches for “roast chicken whole” and “roast chicken oven,” and search guides like “simple” or “cast iron.” These free SEO tools can help, too.

These keywords should be used in your pin title and description, as well as titles and descriptions for your boards. The more information you give the Pinterest algorithm about your content, the better. 

That said, don’t simply dump keywords into the various fields and hope for the best. Keyword stuffing looks spammy and can be off-putting for your audience. 

Add relevant hashtags — carefully

Hashtags still exist on Pinterest — but they’re no longer a way to supercharge your reach. Pinterest functions more like a visual search engine, meaning keywords in your title, description, and boards matter far more than hashtags.

That said, hashtags can still play a supporting role when used sparingly and strategically.

• Stick to 2–5 highly relevant hashtags max.
• Place them at the end of your description, not in the middle.
• Choose clear, searchable terms that align with your keywords.
• Avoid overloading — too many hashtags can look spammy and dilute performance.

Most importantly, focus your effort on natural, keyword-rich descriptions first, and treat hashtags as optional add-ons.

Always include links

Many people save pins as their visual, digital bookmarks to help guide them back to a site they want to see again. So when they click on a pin, they expect to be taken to a landing page to learn more about the idea or information you shared on Pinterest.

That means making sure your Pinterest content includes a relevant link to the source every time — even if the link doesn't lead to your website.

A few quick best practices for the links themselves:

• Use the full URL rather than a link shortener. Pinterest can flag shortened URLs as spammy, and some have been blocked outright in the past.
• Match the pin image to the page it leads to. If someone clicks a pin of a living room and lands on a generic homepage, they'll bounce — and Pinterest notices.
• Add UTM parameters so you can see Pinterest traffic clearly in Google Analytics or your analytics tool of choice.

Get ahead of trends

People come to Pinterest well before the season, holiday, or event they’re planning for. Start saving pins about upcoming trends, seasonal events, or holidays in advance. Then keep adding more ideas daily and maintain a steady pace of content.

Repurpose the right way

Heather calls this “repurposing with purpose.” Sharing content across social media platforms is a great way to make it work harder for you. However, this doesn’t just mean downloading your TikToks and Instagram Reels and popping them on Pinterest. 

Watermarks from other platforms and copyrighted music could harm your content performance, she says. Before pinning, remove those (or, better yet, create videos outside Instagram and TikTok). 

Be patient, stick with it

Unlike many other social networks, where engagement and reach typically happen within the first 24 to 48 hours, content on Pinterest will continue to grow for days, weeks, months, and even years.

How to use Pinterest Analytics to track your performance

With a Pinterest business account, you have powerful analytics tools at your fingertips to help you understand if your content is resonating with your target audience. To find these metrics:

• Log in to your Pinterest business account.
• Click the hamburger icon (three lines) at the top-left of the page.
• Click Analytics overview.

Here, you’ll find a host of helpful metrics, like engagement, engagement rate, impressions, save rate, pin clicks, video views, and more. Pinterest has a handy guide to understanding all the Pinterest analytics terms.

All this data can be overwhelming initially, but Heather recommends focusing on a select few. “I’m going to say impressions, pin clicks, saves, and outbound clicks, in that order.

The four Pinterest analytics metrics that matter most, in priority order:

1. Impressions — the number of times your pin was viewed
2. Pin clicks — the total number of clicks on your pin or ad that open it in closeup
3. Saves — the number of times people saved your pin to a board
4. Outbound clicks — the number of times people take an action that leads them off Pinterest

“Without impressions or pin clicks, you’ll never get outbound clicks. Focus first on reach via impressions, then optimize for each phase of that customer journey to your website,” Heather says. 

I'd second this — when I first started looking at Pinterest Analytics, I got pulled in by save rate and engagement rate, but impressions are where the real diagnostics live. If your pins aren't getting impressions, no amount of optimisation downstream will fix it.

The long game of Pinterest

Remember, you won’t get incredible results right out of the gate with Pinterest. Pinterest growth takes time. Perhaps more than any other social network, Pinterest is a marathon, not a sprint. 

However, for many marketers, small business owners, and creators, this is a welcome change of pace — unlike TikTok and Instagram, your Pinterest content will not disappear from feeds after a couple of hours or days.  

As I’ve mentioned, users could stumble upon your content, finding exactly what they’ve been searching for weeks, months, and years after posting. If you’ve set your pins up for success by following the guidance above, your Pinterest content will have the longevity that makes this possible. 

Happy pinning.

FAQ about using Pinterest

How do I use Pinterest as a beginner?

Create a free Pinterest account (personal or business), set up a few themed boards, and start saving pins you love — either by uploading your own images and videos, or by saving pins you find on Pinterest and around the web. If you're using Pinterest for a business or creator brand, add keywords to your pin titles, descriptions, and board titles so your content shows up in search.

How does Pinterest actually work?

Pinterest works more like a search engine than a social feed. Users search for ideas ("small kitchen," "budget wedding," "productivity tools"), and Pinterest serves up the pins that best match — regardless of when those pins were published or whether the user follows the creator.

What's the difference between a Pinterest personal and business account?

Both account types can create pins and boards. Business accounts add Pinterest Analytics, advertising (idea ads, video ads, carousels, collection ads), product catalogs, and the Pinterest Business/Creator Hub. Personal accounts are suited for saving ideas for your own use. You can switch a personal account to business, or connect a business account to an existing personal profile.

What's the ideal Pinterest pin size?

The recommended aspect ratio for Pinterest pins is 2:3 (vertical), at 600 x 900 pixels. Square pins at 600 x 600 pixels also perform well. Vertical pins take up more space in Pinterest's column-based feed, which helps them stand out.

How long does it take to grow on Pinterest?

Pinterest rewards the slow build. Unlike Instagram or TikTok — where engagement usually happens within 24 to 48 hours — Pinterest content can keep gaining traction for months or even years.

Can I schedule Pinterest pins?

Yes. You can schedule pins natively in Pinterest from a business account, or use a social media scheduling tool like Buffer, which supports Pinterest for both personal and business accounts and lets you cross-post the same content to Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and other platforms at the same time.

More Pinterest resources

• How to Create Your Own Influencer Media Kit (+ Examples from Creators)
• How to Schedule Pinterest Posts (3 Easy Methods + 5 Quick Tips)
• Pinterest Marketing Strategy: A Step-By-Step Guide
• 5 Ways to Make Money on Pinterest: An In-depth Guide for Creators and Businesses

Keeping up with Instagram in 2026 feels like managing a live newsroom. There’s always something new, trends move fast, and maintaining consistency can be exhausting.

You don't have to tackle it alone — and you certainly don't have to spend a fortune. The right tools can save you hours every week and help you show up more consistently without the burnout.

In this article, I’ve rounded up 24 free Instagram tools for creators, marketers, and small businesses. Every tool here has a solid free plan or trial that's actually worth your time. And yes, there are plenty of AI-powered options to streamline your workflow.

Here's what you need to improve your Instagram strategy without breaking the bank.

Key takeaways

• Visuals and video: Canva and CapCut are great for free, high-quality Instagram design and reel editing.
• Efficiency: Tools like Buffer or Meta Business Suite can help you schedule content to stay consistent and save you hours on manual posting.
• Data-driven growth: Instagram’s native insights and SparkToro can help to understand audience behavior and niche trends.
• Automation: Tools like ManyChat can handle high volumes of DMs, automatically turning engagement into leads.
• Drive traffic elsewhere: A clean, well-organized link-in-bio page (like Buffer Start Page) makes it easy to send followers exactly where you want them — whether that's your website, shop, or newsletter.

Instagram content creation tools

Consistently creating polished posts, reels, or stories can be overwhelming. These free content creation tools simplify the process and save you time.

Before you dive in, consider what takes you the longest — is it designing visuals, editing video, or writing captions? Start with the tool that solves your biggest bottleneck, and layer in others as you go.

Canva

Best for: All-round visual content creation

Canva is a favorite among creators, small businesses, and marketers — especially if design isn't your thing. It offers thousands of free Instagram templates across all formats (reels, carousels, stories, you name it), all perfectly sized and ready to go for your Instagram posts.

With its intuitive drag-and-drop interface, you can quickly customize visuals even if you've never designed before.

Standout free features include:

• Access to a huge library of graphics, icons, and stock images
• Video editing capabilities, which work great for reels
• Pre-made and properly-sized templates for every Instagram format
• Canva AI, where you can go from the spark of an idea to complete, published work in one place

Not feeling Canva? Here are two other options worth trying:

1. Adobe Express: Formerly known as Adobe Spark, Adobe Express is a content creator’s dream, offering thousands of free templates for social graphics, reels, stories, and more. It’s especially helpful for quick actions like background removal, video trimming, or adding animations. Best for: Seamless integration with the Adobe ecosystem.
2. Unfold: If elegant, cohesive Instagram Stories or carousels are your thing, Unfold delivers hundreds of beautiful designer templates. With its elegant, minimalist templates, it’s loved by creators and brands for visual storytelling. Best for: Curated library of sleek, design-forward templates.

CapCut

Best for: Desktop and mobile video editing

CapCut is a popular free video editor for creators who want to craft professional-grade reels and stories.

This powerful app (created by ByteDance, which also owns TikTok) lets you edit videos directly from your phone, offering cuts, transitions, captions, effects, and filters — all completely free and without watermarks.

Standout features include:

• Full-featured mobile video editor with 4K export
• Built-in templates, transitions, filters, and effects
• Auto-captions, AI background removal, and trending sounds
• No watermarks on exports

Similar to CapCut, here are some other editors you might consider:

1. Edits: Instagram's own mobile editing app is smooth and slick, and features many of the things we love about CapCut. Best for: Folks who are exclusively focused on Instagram or Facebook.
2. Veed: A browser-based video editor that’s great for teams or creators working on desktop. Veed offers one-click subtitles, screen recordings, and templates for Instagram posts. Best for: Captioning videos quickly, editing on desktop, or repurposing long-form content into short clips.
3. InShot: InShot is a mobile editing classic — ideal for trimming clips, adding music, filters, or text overlays. It’s simple but powerful, especially for on-the-go edits. Best for: Quick cuts, montages, and reels with minimal fuss.

Dupe

Best for: Aesthetic stock images

Dupe offers high-quality images that actually look natural — not like the typical stock photos you've seen everywhere. It offers curated, high-quality imagery for modern brands and aesthetic feeds — all free to use, no attribution required.

The library leans toward lifestyle, fashion, tech, and minimalist vibes — perfect if you're building a modern, aesthetic feed. It's great for filling gaps in your content calendar — or for those days when you don't have access to a camera but still need something that looks good.

Standout free features:

• Curated library of trendy, editorial-style photos
• Categories designed for content creators (think: flat lays, tech, workspace, fashion)
• No login required, completely free to use

Similar to Dupe, here are some stock photo websites to check out:

1. Unsplash: A classic for a reason. Unsplash offers over 3 million high-resolution images contributed by photographers worldwide. It’s a go-to for everything from nature shots to editorial-style portraits — and the search functionality is top-tier.
2. Pexels: Pexels is ideal if you’re after vibrant, dynamic photos and videos. The Pexels collection leans modern and multicultural, and it includes both horizontal and vertical formats — great for Instagram Stories or carousels.

Grammarly's AI Instagram caption generator

Best for: Generating caption ideas fast when you hit a creative block.

Struggling to write engaging captions? Just describe your post and choose a tone (like witty, confident, or friendly), and Grammarly's free caption generator will suggest multiple caption options you can tweak or copy as-is.

Standout features include:

• Multiple AI-generated captions per prompt
• Customize tone, intent, and post type
• No login required to generate ideas

Some other free caption generators to try:

1. Copy.ai: Copy.ai’s social media caption tool helps you create short, catchy captions based on your product, post theme, or content goal. You can also choose a tone (like bold, friendly, or professional), making it easy to tailor content for different audiences. Best for: Caption ideas with a clear CTA or marketing angle.
2. Predis: Predis is an AI social media assistant that auto-generates post captions and visuals from a single prompt. While the full tool is more robust, its free caption generator is worth trying if you want short-form ideas with emojis, hashtags, and brand alignment. Best for: AI-generated posts that include visuals, captions, and hashtags together.

Now, let's simplify your posting schedule with some powerful (and free) scheduling tools.

Instagram scheduling tools

Posting regularly helps you grow on Instagram, but posting daily (or even weekly) can feel impossible without a system.

That's where scheduling tools come in. They let you plan ahead, see how your feed will look, and post when your audience is actually online — without having to set alarms or remember to post manually.

Yes, we're biased, but we think that Buffer is the best free tool to plan and schedule your Instagram posts and stories effortlessly.

Buffer

Best for: Managing and scheduling posts across accounts in one place.

Buffer makes scheduling straightforward — which is why a lot of creators and small businesses use it to stay consistent without the daily stress.

Its generous free plan lets you schedule up to 10 posts per Instagram profile, allowing you to pre-plan your content weeks in advance.

Plus, you can save hashtag groups and even schedule first comments to keep your captions tidy.

Standout features include:

• Connect multiple accounts — up to three Instagram accounts if that’s what you need
• Visual content calendar with drag-and-drop editing
• Preview and arrange your Instagram grid visually
• First comment scheduling and hashtag management included

Another free scheduler to try:

If you're already working within the Meta ecosystem, try Meta Creator Studio (now part of Meta Business Suite).

Meta’s official scheduler lets you plan Instagram posts, reels, carousels, and stories — with the peace of mind that comes from using a native tool. It’s ad-free and fully integrated with your business or creator account to post right to your Instagram feed. Best for: Those who want direct-to-Instagram scheduling and built-in analytics — no third-party apps needed.

Next up, let’s get into some free Instagram tools that unlock valuable insights — making data-driven growth simpler than ever.

Instagram analytics tools

Creating content is important, but understanding what resonates with your audience is what actually drives growth. That's where Instagram analytics tools come in.

Instead of guessing what works, these tools show you exactly which posts your audience loves, when they're most likely to be scrolling, and how healthy your account is overall. Whether you want to track engagement rates, audit your follower quality, or identify your top-performing reels, there's a free tool for that.

Instagram’s native insights

Best for: Getting built-in analytics directly from Instagram.

Instagram’s built-in analytics tool is the first place to start. If you have a creator or business account, you automatically get access to Instagram Insights — no setup required. It covers all the essentials: post reach, follower demographics, your most engaging content, and even breakdowns by format (reels, carousels, stories).

Standout free features:

• Track reach, impressions, and profile activity
• See your top-performing Instagram posts across reels, carousels and stories
• Understand follower growth and audience demographics
• No setup or third-party access required

If you want analytics built into the tool you're already using to schedule and manage your content, Buffer makes that easy. You get a clear picture of what's working on Instagram — without needing to jump between tabs or apps.

Now, let’s dive into audience research and hashtag discovery — essential for reaching exactly the right people.

Audience research and hashtag tools

Audience research and hashtag tools can help you understand who your followers are, what topics they care about, and how to surface your content through the right keywords, tags, and trends.

These tools take the guesswork out of reach and discovery — so you’re not just creating great posts, but making sure the right people see them.

SparkToro

Best for: Discovering what your audience reads, watches, and follows.

SparkToro helps you understand your audience in depth. Enter a keyword, topic, or Instagram handle, and you'll see what your audience reads, follows, listens to, and talks about — which can help you find collaboration opportunities, relevant hashtags, or content angles they're already interested in. You can use that insight to find creators to collaborate with, hashtags to include, or even content angles your audience is already engaging with elsewhere.

Standout free features:

• 5 free searches per month
• Discover what your audience watches, reads, and follows
• Identify niche hashtags and relevant creators for collabs

If you're looking for even more audience insight or competitor data, try Social Blade.

Social Blade shows you follower growth trends, engagement stats, and performance data for any public Instagram account. It’s great for tracking what’s working for competitors or influencers in your niche. Best for: Benchmarking your own growth and seeing what's working for competitors or other creators in your niche.

Buffer’s free hashtag generator

Best for: Generating relevant Instagram hashtags quickly from a simple prompt.

If you want a quick, AI-powered way to generate Instagram hashtags based on your content, Buffer’s free hashtag generator is a great place to start. Just describe your post in a few words — like “Sunday beach yoga” or “remote work tips” — and it’ll instantly generate relevant hashtags tailored to your niche and audience.

Standout free features:

• No login required — generate hashtags in seconds
• Curates hashtags based on post description or keywords
• Built to suggest relevant, non-spammy tags that boost discoverability
• Unlock unlimited daily uses with a free Buffer account

It’s a solid option for creators, marketers, or small businesses who want to post consistently without overthinking their hashtag strategy. If you're already using Buffer for scheduling, it's even easier to plug these hashtags directly into your content workflow.

Let's explore tools that help you boost engagement and manage your growing community.

Engagement and community management tools

Growing your audience on Instagram requires more than great posts — you need to connect with your followers.

From managing comments and DMs to running giveaways and contests, these tools help you keep up with engagement as your account grows — without losing that one-on-one feel.

Buffer's Community

Best for: Keeping up with comments and DMs without switching apps.

Our research found that replying to your Instagram comments can boost engagement by 21%. Who wouldn't want to see a number like that on their analytics?

But if you've noticed your DMs and comments piling up as your account grows, you're not alone — it can get overwhelming fast.

Buffer's Community pulls all your Instagram comments (plus comments from other platforms) into a single dashboard.

Standout free features:

• See unanswered, newest, or oldest comments at a glance
• Get alerted the moment someone comments
• Manage Threads, LinkedIn, Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, and X all in one place
• Create a new post from a reply

Instead of juggling multiple apps or getting lost in distracting feeds, you can use Buffer's Community to reply, track, and grow all in one place.

ManyChat

Best for: Automating replies to comments and DMs.

ManyChat lets you automate responses in your Instagram inbox — like sending a welcome DM when someone comments a keyword, or instantly delivering a freebie link.

It’s great for lead generation and community building.

Standout features include:

• DM automation based on comments or keywords
• Create flows for FAQs, freebie delivery, or lead capture
• Up to 1,000 contacts on the free plan

If you don’t need full automation, Instagram’s built-in Quick Replies feature lets you create shortcuts for frequent responses in DMs. It’s best for manual but efficient DM replies for small accounts.

CommentGuard

Best for: Creators and businesses with growing comment volume or dealing with trolls or spam.

CommentGuard automatically hides spam, filters out toxic replies, and even flags potential customer inquiries — giving creators and brands more control without having to manually moderate every thread.

Standout features include:

• Auto-moderate comment sections (filter spam, block keywords)
• Real-time comment alerts for brand mentions
• Integrates with Instagram Business accounts

Up next, some tools that help you make the most of your Instagram bio link — your one shot to direct traffic where it matters most.

Link-in-bio and microsite tools

Instagram now lets you add up to five links in your bio, which is great — but they can still feel cluttered and hard for your audience to navigate. Link-in-bio tools solve this problem. They turn those links into a well-designed microsite or content hub that’s easy to update, brand, and organize.

Buffer Start Page

Best for: Sharing multiple links in one easy-to-navigate page.

Start Page is Buffer’s clean, customizable, and 100% free solution to the link-in-bio problem. You can build a mobile-optimized page in minutes — complete with your branding, unlimited links, social embeds, and even email signup blocks.

If you don’t have a full website yet, Start Page is a great way to establish a professional online presence in just a few clicks.

Standout free features:

• Unlimited links, sections, and custom layouts
• Add media like videos, podcast embeds, or product previews
• Email signup blocks to grow your list
• Fast, responsive design (no code required)

Some other tools you can try include:

1. Linktree: The OG link-in-bio tool, Linktree is simple, reliable, and used by millions of creators. Even on the free plan, you can add unlimited links, pick a theme, and view basic analytics on click performance. Best for: If you want a no-fuss solution, this one’s solid.
2. Beacons: Beacons takes the microsite further with built-in monetization. You can collect payments, sell digital products, or add donation links — all on a sleek, mobile-friendly microsite. Best for: Creators who want to turn traffic into income, but note that it’s not available globally.

Pick one or two tools to get started

With so many options, it's tempting to try everything at once. But you'll get more out of these tools if you start small and pick the ones that actually fit your workflow and goals.

The best approach? Start with one or two tools, use them consistently for a few weeks, and add more as you figure out what you actually need.

Here’s how to ease into it:

1. Pick one tool per category to start with. Instead of trying everything, choose one tool in each category that feels easy to use. For example: Buffer for scheduling, CapCut for video editing, and SparkToro for audience insights.
2. Keep your favorites organized. Save the tools you use most in a folder on your phone, or keep a running list in Notion or Google Docs. It'll save you time when you need them later.
3. Free doesn't mean limited. Many of these tools offer features that used to cost money — now powered by AI and easier to use than ever. Try the free versions first — you might find they're all you need.

Whether you're posting once a week or every day, the right tools can make it feel less like a chore and more like something you actually enjoy.

Ready to make Instagram feel more manageable? Pick one tool from this list to try this week and see how it goes. If you want to start with Buffer, you can create your free account here.

FAQ about free Instagram tools

Are free Instagram tools really free?

Yes. Each tool here has a genuine no-cost plan that covers its core features. You only pay if you want extras like larger quotas or premium templates.

Is it safe to connect my Instagram account to third-party tools?

Generally, yes. The tools listed here use Instagram’s official API, so they don’t store your password. You can remove their access at any time under Settings > Security > Apps and websites in Instagram.

Can I schedule Instagram posts for free?

Absolutely. Buffer’s free plan lets you connect one Instagram account and schedule up to 10 posts in advance, so you can map out about a week of daily content without spending a dime. Meta Business Suite is another free option for scheduling directly within Instagram's own ecosystem.

Can using these tools hurt my reach or get my account banned?

No, as long as the tool follows Instagram’s guidelines. Steer clear of any service that guarantees instant followers or likes — those shortcuts can violate Instagram’s terms and damage your reach.

Do I need a business or creator account to use these tools?

It depends on the tool. Some require a creator or business account to work; others work with any account type. In any case, changing to a creator or business account is free and takes under a minute in your Instagram settings. Doing so unlocks native analytics, reel and story scheduling, and access to most of the tools in this list, so it's often worth making the switch either way.

More Instagram resources 

• How to Reset Your Instagram Algorithm When Your Feed Needs a Fresh Start
• 13 Trending Sounds on Instagram (+ How to Use Them)
• 13 Ways to Get More Followers on Instagram (Tried & Tested)
• How the Instagram Algorithm Works
• Instagram Image Size Guide: Post, Story, and Reels Dimensions
• How to Make Money on Instagram: 12 Ideas for Creators and Small Businesses

You don't need millions of followers or superstar status to make money on Instagram. Micro and even nano-influencers on Instagram are supplementing — or even replacing — their income with content creation.

I now have over 15K followers on Instagram, but when I started experimenting with monetization, I had no idea what would actually work. And I tried everything. Affiliate links that made me a few bucks. Brand partnerships that fizzled out. And eventually, a couple of income streams that actually stacked up month after month.

One of the biggest things I've learned? There's no 'easy money' switch here — turning posts into paychecks still takes consistent, thoughtful work.

In this article, I'll share 12 of the most effective ways for you to make money on Instagram. What's really working right now, what's worth skipping, and how you can layer these streams no matter your follower count. Whether you're just starting on Instagram or already have a sizable following, there are options here for everyone.

Key takeaways

• Nano-influencers (1,000–10K followers) earn $10–$100 per sponsored post on Instagram, and rates scale to $10K+ for mega-influencers with 1M+ followers.
• Instagram's three monetization paths are: in-app features (subscriptions, gifts, badges, bonuses), brand partnerships (sponsored posts, user-generated content (UGC), affiliate links), and selling your own products or services.
• Diversifying across two to three income streams is more sustainable than relying on a single Instagram-native feature.
• Gifts only require 500 followers to unlock, making this the lowest-barrier native monetization feature on Instagram.
• Instagram bonuses are the only feature that pays creators directly, but they are invite-only.
• Affiliate marketing and UGC are the most beginner-friendly paths — both work without a large following because brands prioritize content quality over reach.

The three ways most creators make money on Instagram

• In-app monetization: Earn directly through Instagram's built-in features — subscriptions, gifts, badges, and bonuses.
• Self-promotion: Use Instagram as a sales channel for your own products, services, courses, memberships, or merch.
• Brand collaborations: Get paid by brands for sponsored posts, UGC, or affiliate promotions.

Monetization paths at a glance

The 12 monetization methods below fall into three broad paths. Here's how they compare on barrier to entry and payout model:

Instagram Shop is covered separately in section 8 — it has different eligibility (business account required).

Whichever route you pick, steady growth comes from showing up for a clearly defined audience and engaging with them consistently. You can always repurpose content across these streams to get more mileage out of each post.

Let's walk through the 12 monetization methods, starting with what I call Instagram native income — the features built right into the app that help you earn without ever leaving it.

1. Offer exclusive content via subscriptions

Instagram Subscriptions let creators with 10K+ followers charge a monthly fee for exclusive posts, reels, stories, and lives — a built-in recurring revenue stream inside the app. Think of it as having your own membership program right inside Instagram.

Your most engaged followers can become paid subscribers and get access to exclusive content you create just for them. When setting your price, think about the value you're offering while keeping it accessible enough that your followers can actually join in. Subscribers find the content easily on your Instagram feed in a new tab using the crown icon.

Subscriptions at a glance:

• Minimum followers: 10K
• Account type required: Professional (creator or business)
• Minimum age: 18
• Payout mechanism: Monthly recurring fee you set
• Country availability: Select countries only
• Policy requirements: Must meet Instagram's Content Monetization and Partner Monetization policies

When I tested subscriptions, I realized something very quickly. People don't pay for content. They pay for meaningful access. Things like your creative process, unfiltered behind-the-scenes thoughts, tutorials, or personal updates that don't always make it to your main feed. (The stuff that feels like being let into a group chat, basically.)

To turn subscriptions on, you'll need to:

• Be at least 18
• Have a professional Instagram account with at least 10K followers
• Reside in a country where the feature is available (here's a list for your reference)
• Have an Instagram profile that meets Instagram’s Content Monetization and Partner Monetization policies

2. Receive gifts from fans

Instagram Gifts let fans send virtual "stars" on your Instagram Reels that convert to cash at $0.01 per star — available to any professional account with 500+ followers. It's the lowest-barrier way to earn directly from your audience.

Gifts at a glance:

• Minimum followers: 500
• Account type required: Professional (creator or business)
• Minimum age: 18
• Currency: Fans purchase virtual "stars" to send as gifts
• Payout rate: $0.01 USD per star (100 stars = $1 USD)
• Minimum payout: $25 balance
• Availability: Select countries only

The key here is consistency. If you're creating content that makes people feel something — entertained, inspired, or educated — they'll want to give back. I know a few creators who mention gifts casually in their captions. Something like, "If you enjoyed this tip, send a gift to keep the series going." Subtle, human, and never salesy.

It starts small — really small. But the creators I know who treat gifts like a tip jar, not a goalpost, end up surprised by what a year of consistent posting adds up to.

3. Monetize live sessions with badges

Instagram Badges let viewers tip you during live sessions in increments of $0.99, $1.99, or $4.99 — the only native Instagram monetization feature tied to live broadcasts. It's like your audience buying a front-row ticket to your stream.

Badges at a glance:

• Minimum age: 18
• Account type required: Creator
• Payout mechanism: Viewers purchase badges in $0.99, $1.99, or $4.99 increments during your live
• Availability: Select countries only (check the eligibility list when you plan to go live)

The creators I've seen do this best make their lives feel like mini experiences. They pick a consistent day theme — think self-care chats, behind-the-brand Fridays, or community happy hours. You'll see a heart next to the names of people who've bought a badge.

To make the most of badges, let people know they're available at the start of your live — and again when new viewers join.

4. Qualify for Instagram bonuses

Right now, bonuses are the only way Instagram pays creators directly — no audience purchases or subscriptions required. You get these bonuses paid on rolling cycles — and they are available for reels, carousels, and single image posts.

Bonuses at a glance:

• Minimum age: 18
• Account type required: Professional (creator or business)
• Eligibility: Invite-only, varies by region
• Content counted: Up to 150 posts from activation to program end (reels, carousels, single image posts; replays not counted)
• Payout: Lump sums paid at rolling cycles
• Reported rate: ~$0.01–$0.05 per 1,000 views (varies)

These programs are usually invite-only and vary by region, but it's worth keeping an eye out in your professional dashboard. If you receive the invitation, you'll see it on your dashboard. Once you complete the onboarding flow, the platform will count up to 150 pieces of content shared from the week that you activate until the end of the bonus opportunity. The more views and/or plays (replays not included) your content receives, the more money you earn.

I like to think of bonuses as the cherry on top. They're not a core strategy, but when they appear, take them. If you're already consistent with your content, it's a welcome reward for the effort you're already putting in.

How much does Instagram pay per 1,000 views?

There isn't a single published rate, but creators in past bonus programs have reported earning roughly $0.01–$0.05 per 1,000 views, depending on the program, region, and content format. Reels bonuses have historically paid more than image posts — which is one reason short-form video is worth prioritizing if you're chasing bonus income.

Right now, earning money solely through Instagram's built-in features works best if you already have a large following and strong personal brand.

As Instagram's Head Adam Mosseri explains: "If you have a few thousand followers, it doesn’t make sense to focus on trying to monetize that audience," Mosseri says. "You should instead focus on growing that audience or using Instagram in other ways."

Even so, there are good reasons to explore these features:

• Become an early adopter of Instagram’s monetizing features
• Supplement your income from other sources (which includes the other ways to earn on Instagram, below)

Honestly? The next three methods — brand partnerships, UGC, and affiliate marketing — are where most creators start seeing real money, especially if you're under 10K followers.

5. Earn from sponsored posts and brand partnerships

The most common setup: sponsored posts. You create content for a brand, post it on your own page, and get paid for the spot on your feed. This partnership between creator Jade Beason and Adobe Express shows how it works:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jade | Creator, Consultant & Speaker (@jadebeason)

Sponsored content usually includes a "paid partnership" tag or an #ad hashtag. Brands pay Instagram creators for a spot in their feed because they can build brand awareness and earn money by reaching the creator’s audience.

How much can you earn from sponsored posts? It varies based on your niche, location, content quality, follower count, engagement rate, and negotiation skills.

According to Influencer Marketing Hub’s benchmark study, nano-influencers (Instagram influencers with 1,000 – 10k followers) earn between $10 and $100 per post — it only goes up from there.

The numbers vary a lot, sometimes with little changes in the scope of work. For example, a brand will pay more to get usage rights for your sponsored posts.

Buffer's own analysis of social engagement across millions of posts — see our State of Social Engagement report — shows engagement rate, not raw follower count, is the strongest predictor of brand interest, which is why nano- and micro-creators with tight niches often out-earn larger accounts per post.

How to find brands to partner with on Instagram

Many brands — those that actively practice influencer marketing — might reach out to you proactively when they notice you have an engaged social media community that overlaps with their target audience. They might use third-party tools (like influencer discovery software) for this, but you can also grab their attention by tagging them in your posts whenever you create content about them. This can also be an excellent way to showcase your content creation abilities.

If you are in an eligible country, it’s also worth joining Instagram’s creator marketplace. It’s a hub for helping brands connect with the right Instagram influencers for their customers.

Lastly, it’s also worth directly reaching out to the influencer marketers of your favorite brands or even popping them a DM.

One thing to keep in mind: Don’t overload your feed with brand-related posts. It can make your account feel less authentic to your followers.

Annie-Mai Hodge, founder of Girl Power Marketing, says an overload of brand collabs (especially inauthentic ones) can be harmful to growing your Instagram following and engagement long term.

"If your feed starts to feel like a media kit, people stop engaging, and that hurts your chances of monetizing in the long run," she says. "Brands want creators who have influence, not just reach. That means your content should always be designed to serve, entertain, or connect with your audience first."

In general, the most profitable influencer partnerships come from creators who serve their audience first and treat brand deals as a secondary layer — not the main event.

One of my top tips

When you partner with a brand you already love, it doesn't feel like selling. It feels like natural storytelling. At 15K followers, I've had brands pay me hundreds of dollars per post because my audience fits their target perfectly.

One of my earliest partnerships with Etihad Airways came from me tagging a brand I already trusted and was a frequent flyer with in a casual reel. They saw the post, reached out, and it turned into a long-term collaboration. (The ROI on one lazy Instagram tag still surprises me.)

If you're highlighting a brand you love, tag them. It's free visibility for them, and it plants the seed for future paid work for you.

6. Create user-generated content for brands

User-generated content (UGC) deals pay creators to produce branded video or photo content that brands post on their own accounts or use in ads — no follower threshold required. You create the content, hand it over, and the brand publishes it.

For example, hair care brand Fix My Curls often reshares videos by creators who mention their products and credits them in post captions.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Fix My Curls ➰ Curly and Wavy Hair Care (@fiixmycurls)

UGC is a great way to earn money while keeping your own feed focused on your own content. Plus, you don't need a large following to create UGC — brands care more about your creation skills and style.

How to get your first UGC deal on Instagram

Many creators find brands by pitching via DMs on Instagram, responding to comments from brand accounts, or reaching out through email with a few simple videos and a clear offer.

7. Share affiliate links and codes

Affiliate income is one of the most beginner-friendly monetization paths. You earn a commission every time someone buys through your link or code.

Companies will share promo codes or a trackable link (with a UTM code) to calculate how many sales you bring in. These links or promo codes usually include discounts, which give your followers an extra reason to check out the product. Buffer has a free UTM builder that can help you create these unique links in a few steps.

When I started, I promoted products I was already obsessed with — skincare, coffee, a kitchen appliance or two. The stuff I'd recommend to a friend anyway. (My first affiliate payout was small enough to be embarrassing — we're talking single digits.) If your followers trust you, they'll trust your suggestions — and that's what actually converts.

This post by creator Hitika Sachdev is a perfect example of an affiliate partnership. The brand can use the code "Hitika94" to track every sale coming via her.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by ʕ•̫͡•ʔ (@hitikasachdv)

If you're working with promo codes instead of trackable links, you've got options too. Use a link in bio tool like Buffer’s Start Page where you can customize the text associated with the link — add your discount code in the text and link to the brand’s website.

Often, affiliate relationships grow out of existing brand partnerships. A brand might collaborate with you a few times for sponsored content and then offer a performance-based incentive to transition to affiliate marketing.

You can also join affiliate programs that are open to all creators, like Amazon Associates or Pura Vida, which has an affiliate program offering a 15% commission on each sale you bring in. You can apply through their form, and if you meet their requirements, you're in.

With programs like these, you won't have a dedicated brand contact. You’ll probably have a dashboard that will calculate all your earnings, and you’ll have to buy the brand’s products on your own. It's still a solid way to earn from your content — especially when you're promoting products that genuinely fit your audience.

One of the biggest advantages of branded content is that you can start without a huge following or your own product to sell. Plus, you've got multiple ways to work with brands, depending on what fits your style.

Monetizing beyond the app is where Instagram becomes more than just a content platform. It turns into your business engine. Next up, we'll take a look at some ways to do just that.

8. Set up an Instagram shop and shoppable posts

Instagram Shop turns your profile into a digital storefront with tappable product tags that link directly to a catalog — available only to Instagram business accounts in select countries. If you sell physical products, it's your in-app checkout.

You can post a picture or a reel of your product with a tappable link that goes directly to your product catalog. When users click through, they'll see all the info about the product, including prices.

If Instagram Shop isn't available in your region, Buffer's Shop Grid is a perfect workaround. It creates a clickable, shoppable feed experience that still feels native to Instagram. When someone taps your bio link, they'll see exactly what you want them to — your bestsellers, latest posts, or anything else you choose to highlight. You'll also be able to track clicks on each link, so you can see what your audience is most interested in.

9. Promote your own products or services

Promoting your own products or services on Instagram converts followers into customers at higher margins than brand deals, because you keep 100% of the revenue. You can do this by creating a brand account and forming an Instagram strategy. You might not sell products right away, but you'll educate people about your brand and its products.

From digital templates to handmade jewelry to coaching services, what matters most is storytelling. Show people why you created your product and what problem it solves.

Creators like Modern Millie have built strong value around their content. Millie teaches creators how to grow on social and monetize their platforms, and she uses Instagram to promote everything from digital courses to free templates to YouTube tutorials. It's a great example of how clear positioning plus consistent content can lead to real revenue without needing a huge team or a complicated setup.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Camille Adrian | Content Creator Tips (@itsmodernmillie)

10. Sell courses or membership programs

If you’re a creator, you can also earn money by sharing an online course or a membership program that teaches your audience to do something you’re an expert in.

Adriana Blanc often promotes her fitness membership program using her Instagram account.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Adriana Blanc (@adrianatblanc)

Promoting courses, memberships, or exclusive communities is not much different from selling products or services. Focus on highlighting the value of your offer and hitting the pain points of your target audience.

11. Run Instagram ads to drive sales

Running Instagram ads with a $50–$100 test budget lets you identify which organic posts convert best, then amplify the winners to new audiences. If you're selling a digital product or service, Instagram advertising can meaningfully expand your reach.

Running Instagram ads means boosting some content on your feed, so it reaches a broader audience. Ideally, this boosted content helps you sell products and earn more money than you are spending.

Advertising can help you reach new users and build your audience — in turn, helping you sell more products — but that doesn't mean hitting 'boost' and hoping for the best. Start with around $50 to $100 and test which videos or messages actually land. Use what you learn to refine your organic content too — the hooks, visuals, and topics that pull in your ideal audience. You can analyze performance along the way to see which creatives earn their keep.

Think of that first $100 as tuition, not a launch budget.

12. Design and sell merch

Sometimes your brand becomes your product. If you've built a strong personal brand on Instagram, you can monetize it by designing unique merchandise.

Maybe it's a phrase you repeat often, an aesthetic your followers love, or an inside joke your community enjoys.

Sabrina Zohar, a dating coach and influencer, did this brilliantly. She turned repeat phrases she uses in her podcast, The Sabrina Zohar Show, into a recognizable brand that her audience already felt ownership over.

Convert your posts to paychecks

Remember that monetization on Instagram isn't about chasing every single income stream. It's about finding what feels authentic to you and your audience. Start small. Pick one or two ideas from this list and test them for at least a few months. See what feels sustainable, what excites you, and what naturally fits your content rhythm.

No matter which route you take, applying a few timeless principles — solving a real problem for your audience and standing out with a clear, differentiated niche — will boost your chances of success.

The not-so-glamorous reality? The more your audience grows, the more admin comes with it — comments to reply to, DMs to juggle, performance to analyze, and a content calendar that won't fill itself.

That's the bit Buffer quietly handles for me. Scheduling, engaging, analyzing, a custom bio link — all in one place, so I can actually spend my time making the content that earned me the audience in the first place. You can try it free if that sounds like your kind of help.

Now I'd love to hear from you — which of these 12 ideas are you going to try first? Come find me on Instagram and tell me what's working.

FAQ about making money on Instagram

Do Instagram users get paid directly by the app?

Sometimes. Instagram can pay creators through in-app tools like subscriptions, gifts, badges, and (in some cases) bonuses. But many creators earn most of their income outside the app through brand partnerships (like sponsored posts and UGC), affiliate marketing, and selling their own products or services.

How much does Instagram pay for 1,000 views?

There isn’t a single guaranteed rate. In practice, creators often see rough ranges around $0.01–$0.05 per 1,000 views, but it varies a lot based on the specific program, your eligibility, your audience, and what Instagram is offering at the time. Reels bonuses have historically paid more per view than carousels or single image posts.

How many views on Instagram do you need to make money?

There's no universal view threshold — bonuses are invitation-only and tied to content performance, not raw views. For brand deals, views and engagement together usually matter more than any single number. For reels specifically, Instagram's bonus programs have historically focused on creators whose reels consistently earn 10K+ plays, but eligibility varies by region and program.

How many followers do I need to get paid on Instagram?

You don't need a fixed follower count. Instagram's in-app monetization features have specific thresholds — 500 followers for gifts, 10K for subscriptions (although requirements may vary by region and over time) — but brand deals, UGC work, and affiliate marketing have no minimum.

How much do nano-influencers make on Instagram?

Nano-influencers (creators with 1,000–10K Instagram followers) typically earn $10–$100 per sponsored post, according to Influencer Marketing Hub. Rates vary based on niche, engagement rate, content quality, and usage rights — for example, a brand will pay more for permission to repurpose your post as a paid ad. Many nano-creators stack multiple income streams (sponsored posts plus affiliate links plus UGC) to reach a sustainable monthly income rather than relying on post fees alone.

Can you make money on Instagram without a lot of followers?

Yes. The three lowest-barrier paths are UGC (no minimum), affiliate links (no minimum), and selling your own products via an Instagram Shop or link-in-bio page. Nano-influencers often out-earn macro accounts on engagement-based deals because brands prioritize niche fit and engagement rate over raw reach.

Can you make money on Instagram without showing your face?

Yes. User-generated content is the most common path for creators who prefer to stay off-camera — brands hire you to produce product demos, unboxings, or voiceover videos that they post on their own accounts. Affiliate marketing, running an Instagram Shop for physical or digital products, and selling courses or templates also work without a personal brand tied to your face. Faceless accounts in niches like finance tips, book reviews, recipe reels, and aesthetic aggregator pages routinely monetize through these paths.

What do I need to qualify for Instagram’s money-making tools?

Depending on the feature, there are a couple of requirements you need to meet, like being at least 18, using a professional account, following Instagram’s Content Monetization and Partner Monetization policies, meeting any follower or engagement thresholds, living in a country where the feature is available, and setting up payouts so Instagram can send you earnings.

How do I start earning money on Instagram if I’m new?

Start by choosing a clear niche, posting consistently, and engaging with the people who comment or reply to your stories. Then pick one income path to focus on first (like UGC, affiliate links, or promoting a small offer), and build from there. Tools like Buffer can help you stay consistent by scheduling posts ahead of time.

More Instagram resources

• How to Get Verified on Instagram: 2 Ways to Get Your Blue Check
• 13 Trending Sounds on Instagram (+ How to Use Them)
• Replying to Your Instagram Comments Can Boost Engagement by 21%
• Best Time to Post on Instagram: New Data from 9.6 Million Posts
• How to Use Instagram for Business: The Complete Guide
• Instagram Stories: The Complete Guide to Using Stories to Boost
• How to Share Instagram Feed Posts to Stories: 3 Simple Steps
  

A video I posted to Instagram on a whim hit 110,000 views this month.

I originally made it for LinkedIn as part of my content pillars: a simple video on where to find remote jobs. Somewhere in the middle of exporting it, I thought, why not just post it everywhere? So I did.

And Instagram was where it really took off. Which was strange, because I've been on Instagram since 2016. That's 10 years of birthday carousels and travel photo dumps, and never once treating it like somewhere I could actually grow.

If you've been following my Proof of Concept series, you know I've spent the last few months trying to grow on Threads. I had a plan, complete with a follower goal, a deadline, and the results of applying all the rules I recommend to other people.

I didn’t get to 1,000 on Threads by December 15, 2025. And after one accidental crosspost, I'm not sure Threads is where I should have been trying to grow in the first place.

So here's what has changed.

A quick recap on Proof of Concept

If you're new to the Proof of Concept series, here's what you need to know: after hitting 20,000 followers on LinkedIn, I wanted to get back to experimenting with content the way I used to, before I knew what "worked."

The first platform I tested was Threads. My goal was to grow from 366 followers to 1,000 by December 15, 2025, organically, through consistency and curiosity.

I'm at 824 today. Not quite 1,000, but close enough that I'd probably have gotten there if I kept going. But I'm not trying to close that gap anymore because I'm no longer sure it's the right platform to test this on.

So why am I pivoting? A few things happened at once.

The first was that Threads is faster than I'm used to from LinkedIn. On LinkedIn, I'm writing for people scrolling between meetings. The pacing is slower, and a post can afford to wind up before it lands. Threads is the opposite: the posts that travel there are reactive and short. I was constantly translating my thinking into a format I hadn't built real muscle for yet, which meant I was figuring out what good looked like in real time while also trying to grow.

The second was that I didn't have enough fluency with the platform to form a good hypothesis in the first place, never mind test one. A Proof of Concept works best when you already have enough intuition for a platform that you can actually test something. I was still learning Threads. That's a different project.

And then the third thing happened, which I didn't expect: Instagram started working. One of my cross-posted videos hit 110K views, and suddenly I had an actual recipe for virality on a platform I could play with. That got me excited about Instagram in a way I hadn't been about Threads in a while. And at some point, I had to be honest with myself that the energy was pulling me somewhere else.

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I'm not done with Threads. I still have a profile, I still post, and I'm still curious about it. But it's time for a pivot.

Why I'm pivoting to Instagram (the platform I've avoided for 10 years)

For years, there was a voice in the back of my head going, "Whoa, the people who actually know you are going to see this."

That's a bit embarrassing to type. But it's the truth.

I made my Instagram in 2016, back when the platform was still mostly doing what it originally promised: a place to stay in touch with friends and family and keep your people updated on your life. That's how I used it, and for a long time, that's all I wanted it to be.

When people started turning Instagram into a creator platform, I felt a lot of resistance. I couldn't fully explain it at first, but I recently figured it out.

My LinkedIn, TikTok, and Threads accounts all came after I was deep into my career and already sold on the idea of becoming a creator. Those were creator accounts from day one. Instagram was the only profile I had from before any of that, and the people who followed me there were people who actually knew me: friends, family, people from school, old coworkers, the girl I met in the bathroom at a bar, and so on.

So the thought of posting creator content into that feed made me shy, in a genuine way I didn't expect.

I also had a mental block about what starting on Instagram would have to look like. I assumed I'd need to build a whole new profile, or if I kept this one, I'd have to unroot ten years of personal history to make it "on-brand." Either way, it had to be a production.

Turns out, it didn't.

What actually happened

I made a couple of videos for LinkedIn: one for my Buffer work anniversary, a couple about what I do at Buffer, and one about where to find remote jobs. I was experimenting with hooks on screen, different video styles, all the things I'd been telling other people to try. Then I thought, why not crosspost them to Instagram and TikTok? So I did.

Cross-posting the videos on TikTok helped me pass 1,000 followers, which was nice. But Instagram was where something actually happened. One of the videos hit 110,000 views, and I grew from about 1,200-ish to 2,319 followers in a matter of weeks.

And it all happened because I was finally applying all the advice I had been sharing with other people.

I'm Instagram-native, I just haven’t been acting on it

I've been on Instagram for a decade. I know what a good reel looks like, how to identify trending sounds, and what to put in a photo dump to make it nonchalant. None of that came from (just) observing and studying creators, but from being a regular user for ten years, building intuition I never thought of as a skill.

That's different from where I was on Threads. On Threads, I was still figuring out the language. On Instagram, I already speak it. I just hadn't been using it to say anything.

Which changes what this next Proof of Concept is testing. The Threads hypothesis was whether consistency and curiosity could get me to 1,000 followers organically. The Instagram hypothesis is more interesting to me: what happens when you lean into a platform you're already fluent in?

For other creators reading this: the platform you're avoiding might be the one you'd grow on fastest. The resistance you feel toward it is probably what's kept you from noticing how much you already know.

My plan for Instagram

I've set some rules for this pivot to Instagram that are purposefully looser than the ones I had for Threads. I'm leaning on intuition for the creative calls and on the proven tactics from Sabreen's growth playbook for the mechanics.

Speaking of, you can check out Sabreen's full list of recommendations here — she's grown her own account past 15K followers and Buffer's past 100K, so she knows what she's talking about. I'm borrowing from it liberally.

The goal

I want to grow from 2,319 followers to 5,000 by the end of Q2 2026. That's about 10 weeks from the day this article publishes, and yes, it's a bigger jump than my Threads goal of 1,000 (from 366), but if I'm right about the Instagram-native thing, the growth rate should reflect that.

The posting cadence

Sabreen's data-backed recommendation is 3–5 posts per week, which grows followers 2x faster than posting 1–2 times. That's the cadence I'm aiming for. But I'm not setting a daily minimum, and I'm not going to feel bad about skipping days. I want this round to feel like play, not a checklist. If I hit 3 posts a week while staying in play mode, I'll take it.

The approach

If I see a trend I want to try, I'll try it the same day. If I have an idea, I'll create it in whatever format feels right and figure out after the fact what landed.

I'm using the full format mix Sabreen recommends: Reels for reach (they get 36% more reach than other post types), carousels for engagement (they drive 12% more engagement), and photo dumps when the mood strikes. Kirsti, who's also been growing on Instagram, gave me one more recommendation I'm taking to heart:

"I now always create two slightly different versions of the same content and post them as trial reels 24 hours before I want them to go live. Then I see which one performs the best. My theory is that trial reels force Instagram to push your content to people who may actually be interested in the specific reel, rather than just your followers. It's a great way to help you reach the audience you want rather than the audience you have."

I'm definitely going to try her approach, which she's also expanded on in this article. Trial reels also let me experiment without committing a post to my main grid, which fits the "treat this like play" energy I want.

The content pillars (for now)

The topics I'm leading with: what I've learned growing on LinkedIn, how I've landed brand partnerships there, remote work advice, and my career journey. I'm leaning on what I already know works. These are topics my existing audience trusts me on, so they're my on-ramp to Instagram.

I know I can't lean on them forever. Instagram is not LinkedIn, and eventually, I want to figure out what my pillars are native to the platform. But right now, this is what's resonating, so I'm going to ride it until something more Instagram-specific clicks into place.

Engagement as a growth tactic

One more from Sabreen's list that I'm making a real habit: replying to comments. Her data shows it boosts engagement by 21%, and more importantly, it's how you turn first-time viewers into people who actually stick around. For an account that's been mostly passive for 10 years, this is the shift that will feel the most different.

What success looks like (beyond the follower count)

Hitting 5,000 would be great. But I'm defining a few other wins for myself too:

Building Instagram-native fluency while my topics still lean LinkedIn-adjacent

Most of what I talk about, i.e., remote work, job hunting, career stuff for early-to-mid career professionals, doesn't look or feel like the Instagram content in my feed. It's not the fashion, food, or wellness content that dominates my feed. I want to see if I can make my topics Instagram-shaped without stripping the substance out of them. If the 110K-view video is any indication, the answer might be yes. But one video isn't a pattern, so we’ll see.

Build visual taste as a skill

On LinkedIn and Threads, the craft is mostly writing. Instagram is a different craft. Pacing, framing, color, sound, all things I haven't had to think much about on the other platforms. I've always had a good eye for aesthetics, I just didn't point it at my own content. I'm curious whether leaning into that changes how I think about my content on the other platforms, too.

How much of this is the platform, and how much of it is me finally trying?

This is the one I don't have a clear answer for. I've been on Instagram for 10 years and never tried. It's possible that any platform would start to work once I actually showed up for it, but I'll know for sure in a few months.

And then there's the thing I'm not going to hype up just yet, so let’s keep this between us: if I hit 5,000 followers, the next Proof of Concept is probably about turning an Instagram audience into income. Brand partnerships, specifically. I've done a handful of paid partnerships on LinkedIn over the last two years, but Instagram is where the real brand partnership money lives. I want to see what it looks like to build it intentionally, as a smaller creator, and share the numbers.

But that's a story for another article.

More resources

• Everything I’m Trying to Grow to 1,000 Followers on Threads
• I Reached 20,000 Followers on LinkedIn and I Feel Weird About It

Instagram Stories are always the first thing I tap on when I open the app. I love seeing the more personal, in-the-moment updates — the kind of content that’s less polished and more like a window into someone’s day, like a short clip of a creator’s workspace, a sneak peek at a product photoshoot, or a casual poll asking what color to restock.

Stories appear right at the top of the app, which means your audience sees them before they even start scrolling. They offer a low-pressure way to show up consistently when your followers open Instagram.

Key takeaways

• Visibility: Stories appear at the top of the app, ensuring your content is seen before users start scrolling.
• Engagement: Use interactive stickers like polls, quizzes, and 'Add Yours' to turn passive viewers into active participants.
• Strategy: Aim to post one to seven stories daily to stay top of mind, and make sure followers tap through them all.
• Conversion: The link sticker is available to all accounts, making it a great way to drive traffic to external sites.
• Longevity: Use highlights to save important stories permanently on your profile for new followers to discover.

What is an Instagram Story?

An Instagram Story is a feature that allows users to post photos or videos that automatically disappear within 24 hours. They appear in a vertical format and are fast, memorable, and fun by design. 

When you post a story, a colorful ring appears around your Instagram profile picture, telling your followers they can tap on your profile photo to see what you've just posted.

Followers can also reply to your stories through DMs or interact with them using stickers like polls and questions, making stories feel more like a two-way conversation than a one-way broadcast.

Your profile picture with the colorful ring around it also gets added to the top row of your followers’ home screens — known as the stories tray— making it the first thing they see when they open the Instagram app.

Instagram Stories are an ideal way for creators and brands to experiment with different kinds of content because, unlike your permanent curated feed, stories disappear in 24 hours.

You can also limit who sees a story by sharing it only with your Close Friends list — handy for behind-the-scenes peeks, client-only updates, or anything you’d rather keep to a smaller circle.

Small business owners use their stories to post everything from unedited videos at work to photos of their new products and short clips of them answering FAQs.

If you're a creator, stories are a great place to be a little more relaxed — taking followers along for a day, sharing behind-the-scenes moments, or talking with your audience about something you're both going through.

Why post Instagram Stories?

Stories aren’t designed to bring in new followers. They help you stay close to the ones you already have.

Adam Mosseri, Head of Instagram, described them as “a way to reach your most passionate audience.”

Instagram adds built-in interactive tools that make stories so effective. You can run polls, add questions, or link directly to a product if you sell on Instagram.

Instagram launched stories in 2016, and it didn’t take long for the feature to catch on. Within two years, more than 500 million people were creating and watching stories daily.

In short, stories can help you:

• Stay visible and top of mind with followers — stories appear at the top of the app, making them one of the most visible placements.
• Increase engagement and build loyalty over time through interactive features like polls, questions, and quizzes.
• Drive traffic and conversions — half of Instagram users have visited a website to make a purchase after seeing it in stories.

How to post an Instagram Story

Ready to post your first (or next) story? Here's exactly how to do it.

1. Open the camera: Tap the + button, and select Story.
2. Capture or upload: Tap the white circle to take a photo/video, or tap the album icon to upload media (Dimensions: 1080px x 1920px; Max length: 60s).
3. Select story type: Choose from Standard, Create, Boomerang, AI Images, Layout, or Hands-free modes.
4. Add interactive elements: Use the sticker icon to add polls, links, mentions, or music.
5. Share: Tap Your story or Close Friends to publish.

⚡ Pro tip: If you want to create stories even faster, you can create your content in bulk and schedule those stories ahead of time with Buffer's planning and scheduling tools. Buffer’s story tools will show you what your story is going to look like when it's live and let you schedule it ahead of time, too.

You’ve also got a few lightweight options for adding other kinds of posts to your stories that work a bit differently:

• As of late 2025, you can add someone else’s story to yours, even if you weren’t tagged in the original post.
• You can also share your own feed posts, reels, and carousels to your stories. Tap the paper airplane icon below the post and then Add to story to create it.
• You can share posts from a few other apps to your stories as well. If a happy customer gives you a shoutout on Threads, or your podcast’s new episode drops on Spotify, tap on Stories or Story in the share menu for that app.

⚡ Pro tip: Prefer to keep your feed posts for your followers only? If your account is public, head to Settings → Sharing and reuse and toggle off Posts and reels to stories. That prevents anyone from adding your content to their own story.

Different types of Instagram Stories

Instagram offers a couple of different Instagram Story types to play with. For more variety, scroll down to our section on stickers.

Standard

What is it? A regular photo or video — the default Instagram Story option. In this mode, you can add filters, which appear at the bottom of the app.

When to use it: This is your go-to for quick, everyday content — a product shot, a short clip from your workspace, or a selfie with a text overlay sharing a thought or update.

Create

What is it? Text or stickers on a solid background. Accounts usually use text stories to pose a question, tell a story, or create mini-blogs within their Instagram Stories.

When to use it: Great for sharing a quick thought, hot take, or announcement when you don't have (or need) a photo or video to go with it.

Boomerang

What is it? A really short video that plays forward and backward on a loop.

When to use it: Perfect for adding a playful, eye-catching moment — like clinking glasses, unwrapping a package, or a confetti toss.

Layout

What is it? A collage of different photos, with a few preset collage options.

When to use it: Ideal for before-and-after shots, showing off multiple product colors, or recapping an event in a single story frame.

Hands-free

What is it? Video mode where you can record video without tapping and holding the record button.

When to use it: Handy when you need both hands free — like demonstrating a recipe, styling an outfit, or giving a walkthrough of your space.

How to use Instagram Story stickers to boost engagement

Instagram Stories are so powerful because they help you build loyalty and boost engagement by showing the human side of your business. Stickers are one of the best tools Instagram has built into stories to help you connect with your audience — and they're a lot of fun to use.

What are Instagram Story stickers?

Instagram Story stickers are creative elements you can place on your stories to make them more engaging and interactive.

You can add more than one sticker to a story. To add stickers, take or upload a photo or video, and then tap the stickers button (a smiley face on the top of the screen) to find customizable stickers for the weather, the current time, location, and more.

You can move stickers by dragging them across your screen and resizing them by pinching or expanding them with two fingers.

Here are some of my favorites.

1. Add Yours sticker

Instagram's Add Yours sticker lets creators start public threads to connect content with a similar theme. When more users add their stories to the sticker, it creates a content chain that brings different users — including those who don’t follow you — into the conversation.

Try it: Create an Add Yours prompt related to your niche — like "Show us your desk setup" or "Your go-to morning drink" — to encourage followers (and their followers) to participate and spread your content organically.

2. Captions sticker

You can add automated subtitles or transcripts to your stories by simply adding this sticker.

Keep in mind that this feature isn't available everywhere yet — it's currently rolling out in select languages and locations.

3. Shopping sticker

If you have Instagram Shopping set up for your business account, you can use the shopping sticker to add clickable product icons to your story.

4. Donation sticker

The donation sticker is an interactive sticker Instagrammers use to encourage donations to a specific cause. People who tap the sticker can donate within Instagram to the linked cause.

5. Quiz sticker

The quiz sticker lets you add an interactive, multiple-choice-type question to your stories so you can ask your followers fun questions and see which ones get the right answer.

6. Question sticker

You can use the question sticker to ask your followers a question. It can help you gather some insights into what your followers or customers love, what they're interested in, what they'd like to see, and more.

You can also flip it — use the question sticker to let your followers ask you a question, and create new stories where you answer them.

7. Poll sticker

The poll sticker allows you to ask your followers a question, giving them four poll options to choose from. All the sections are fully customizable, and you can easily share the results to your story, too.

Try it: Use polls to involve your audience in real decisions — like "Which packaging do you prefer?" or "What topic should I cover next?" It's a low-effort way to boost interaction and gather useful feedback at the same time.

8. Countdown sticker

If you want to build anticipation around a product launch or event, include the countdown sticker so they can quickly tap to get a reminder for the date.

Some other fun stickers you can use are:

1. Location sticker: Tag the location of your story
2. Music sticker: Add a song as a soundtrack for your story
3. Hashtag sticker: Tap into a trending Instagram hashtag or create your own
4. Time and/or weather sticker: Personalize your content
5. GIF sticker: Adds a fun, interactive element
6. Mention sticker: Tag other Instagram accounts

The Instagram Story link sticker

The link sticker technically belongs in the sticker category above, but I’m giving it its own shoutout because of just how useful this one is. The link sticker allows you to place strategic links anywhere on your story.

Here are some ways you can use the link sticker:

• Send people to a product page during a launch or restock
• Link to a new blog post or newsletter signup form
• Share your latest YouTube video or lead magnet like a free download
• Direct followers to a booking calendar or inquiry form
• Highlight a press feature or media mention

How to add a link to your Instagram Story

1. Go to your Instagram Stories sticker tray and tap the sticker that reads Link.
2. Paste your link into the link field.
3. If you have a long or unwieldy URL, tap the “Customize sticker text” button to type in any text you'd like and tap Done.
4. You can change the color of your sticker by tapping on it, pinch to resize, and drag it to where you'd like it to appear on the story.

What are Instagram Story highlights?

Instagram Story highlights are collections of Instagram Stories that you curate to stay on your profile even after they expire. They're located at the top of your profile in the form of tappable circles.

Think of highlights as a way to extend the life of your best story content. Instead of disappearing after 24 hours, your most useful or popular stories live on your profile permanently — right above your regular feed.

A few ideas for organizing your highlights:

• FAQs — Answer common questions so new visitors can get up to speed fast
• Reviews or testimonials — Social proof that sticks around
• Product or service categories — Make it easy for potential customers to browse what you offer
• Behind the scenes — Give people a reason to feel connected to your brand

How to create a highlight:

1. Open a current story and tap the Highlight icon at the bottom of the screen, or go to your profile and tap the + button under your bio.
2. Select the stories you want to include from your archive.
3. Name your highlight and choose a cover image.

Once you're done, your Instagram Stories highlight will appear as a bubble on your profile. You can have as many highlights as you like, and they will stay on your profile until you remove them. To edit or remove a highlight, just tap and hold that highlight on your profile.

You can add stories to highlights at any time. Go to Archive in your app settings, open the story, and tap the Highlight button at the bottom of the screen. Choose the highlights you want to add to (you can choose more than one), and you’re done.

Instagram Story analytics

Tracking how your stories perform helps you figure out what resonates and what to do more of. If you have an Instagram creator or business account, you can access analytics in the app.

To check analytics for a specific story, tap the story, then the Activity icon in the lower-left corner of your screen.

⚡ Pro tip: If you want to track story performance over time, a tool like Buffer can help you monitor trends and compare results across your content.

From your analytics, you will see:

• How many followers and non-followers your story has reached
• How people interacted with your story (tap for the next story, finish the story, go back, exit)
• How many Instagram Story views you received
• How many people followed you after viewing that story

Check story analytics from Instagram Insights

You'll be able to access all this data and more via Instagram Insights, where all the metrics for your Instagram posts — stories, carousels, reels, and more. Yes, you'll even find stats for Instagram Stories that have already expired.

To get to your insights:

• Tap the Professional dashboard button beneath your bio.
• For metrics specific to your Instagram Stories, tap on Content you shared.
• Tap the All button on the top left, then tap Stories.
• Your stories will automatically be arranged by reach, from highest to lowest. Tap on a specific story to get more data, such as reach, likes, replies, shares, and more.

Building an Instagram Story strategy that works

The Instagram Stories algorithm decides where you appear in each follower's stories tray — and it's based on a few key signals. How often someone views or interacts with your stories, whether they DM you, and how recently you posted all play a role.

Stories appear at the top of the feed, giving you prime visibility. And the more consistently you show up with content people engage with, the higher you'll rank in their tray.

Here are five ways to make that work in your favor.

1. Post Instagram Stories daily

Our Instagram Stories research suggests that posting between one and seven Instagram Stories per day will yield the best results. Over 70% of accounts that posted within this range had a high stories completion rate.

2. Post stories consistently and at optimal times

Showing up regularly is what keeps you visible and at the top of your followers' trays. Given that stories only last for 24 hours, you want to maximize their reach by posting when your followers are most active.

You can check when your audience is online through Instagram's native insights (under New Followers > Most Active Times).

If you're managing multiple accounts or want to plan your story schedule alongside your other content, a scheduling tool like Buffer lets you queue up stories in advance so you never miss your window.

3. Take advantage of creative features and tools

As you'll have seen above, Instagram has plenty of fun features to help you get creative with. You can create your stories right on the Instagram app or use other tools to create and prep them ahead of time.

Worth knowing: Instagram's algorithm can limit the reach of stories that have visible watermarks from other apps (like TikTok). Posting natively or using a clean version of your video is an easy fix that keeps your reach intact.

4. Use Instagram Story ads to boost reach, engagement, and conversions

Stories created for ad placements help small business owners reach a targeted audience. Because they take up the whole screen, your audience won’t see content from other brands — just your ad.

To save you time on content creation, make use of existing stories saved in your highlights. If you have an Instagram shop, you can use product links so users can purchase your products directly through the ad.

5. Use Instagram Story templates to make your story pop

There are perks to tapping into templates to create visually appealing Instagram Stories. For one thing, you can batch create them (making it oh-so-much easier to schedule your stories in advance).

It's also a great way to maintain brand consistency that you can even carry across your Instagram Reels and carousel posts.

Take your Instagram Stories to the next level with Buffer

Stories have become an incredibly important part of brand awareness and should absolutely be included in your Instagram marketing strategy.

With Buffer, you can plan, preview, and schedule your Instagram Stories ahead of time, so you have everything ready to post with a single push notification. Get started for free now →

FAQ about Instagram Stories

What’s the difference between an Instagram Story and a regular post?

The big difference is lifespan and intent. Stories disappear after 24 hours, sit at the top of the app, and are great for quick, interactive moments with your existing followers. Feed posts stick around permanently, can appear in Explore, and are better for reaching new audiences over time. Think of stories as the conversation, and your feed as the portfolio.

How long do Instagram Stories last?

Each story stays visible for 24 hours after posting. After that, it moves to your story archive (if you have archiving enabled), where you can revisit it or add it to a highlight at any time.

How many Instagram Stories can you post in a day?

There's no official daily limit. You can post as many stories as you'd like, though our research suggests that one to seven stories per day tends to hit the sweet spot for completion rates. After that, viewers are more likely to tap through or drop off.

How do I find someone's Instagram story?

Stories appear at the top of your home screen in the stories tray. Look for a profile picture with a colorful ring around it — that means they have an active story. Tap the ring to watch it.

If you don't see them in the tray, go to their profile directly and tap their profile photo. If the ring is there, their story is still live.

How do I see who viewed my Instagram Story?

Tap your story to open it, then tap the Activity icon in the lower-left corner. You'll see a list of everyone who watched. Instagram keeps viewer data available for 48 hours after the story expires.

Can people see if I view their Instagram Story?

Yes. When you watch a story, Instagram adds your username to the viewer list that only the story owner can see. They won’t know how many times you viewed it — just that you did.

However, Instagram is reportedly testing a feature that would let premium users view stories without showing up on the viewer list.

Can someone see if I screenshot their Instagram Story?

No. Instagram does not notify users when someone takes a screenshot of their story. The one exception is vanish-mode DMs — but for regular stories, screenshots are completely private.

More Instagram resources

• How to Reset Your Instagram Algorithm When Your Feed Needs a Fresh Start
• 13 Trending Sounds on Instagram (+ How to Use Them)
• 13 Ways to Get More Followers on Instagram (Tried & Tested)
• How the Instagram Algorithm Works
• Instagram Image Size Guide: Post, Story, and Reels Dimensions
• 26 Free Instagram Tools to Help Grow Your Account

As a type A perfectionist, there are few things that give me more satisfaction than a good old spring clean. Come change of seasons, I’m always overcome with the urge to clear out drawers, declutter cupboards, and rearrange shelves.

Doing it is a bit of a slog, of course — but that feeling you get after a good tidy-up? Worth every second.

Now, wouldn’t it be neat if we could do the same for our online spaces?

(You see where I’m going with this) As it happens, you can — on Instagram, at least. And, unlike spring cleaning, it won’t do a number on your back.

In late 2024, the social media platform introduced a way for you to hit the reset button on their Instagram algorithm — completely wiping the slate clean on their home, reels, and explore feeds. The feature started as a test and has since rolled out globally.

Instagram launched this feature with teens in mind (more on this below), but honestly, it’s a wildly underrated new tool for anyone looking to refresh their social media experience without starting from scratch with a new account.

Here’s everything you need to know about this handy feature. Bye-bye, sad late-night doom-scroll. It's time for a fresh start.

Key takeaways

• Fresh start: Instagram allows users to completely wipe their recommendation algorithm for explore, reels, and the home feed.
• User control: The feature is available to all users (not just teens) to help better match content with current interests or protect mental health.
• What stays: Resetting does not unfollow accounts, remove ads, or delete your existing posts and messages.
• Retraining: After a reset, your initial interactions (likes, shares, watch time) are critical for training the new algorithm.
• Manual review: During the reset process, you have the option to review and unfollow accounts to further refine your experience.

What exactly is an Instagram algorithm reset?

An Instagram algorithm reset is a feature that lets you clear your recommended content across explore, reels, and feeds to start fresh.

To understand this, it’s helpful to know a little bit about how the Instagram algorithm works. Over time, you’ve given Instagram hundreds of thousands of signals about the kinds of content you want to see more of. Likes, comments, and shares are the obvious ones, but even the more subtle, passive signals can shape your feed. Think, time spent lingering on a shocking video you just can’t turn away from — all of those little moments can add up.

Best case scenario, you might find your feeds are no longer helpful for where you’re at in your life (for example, videos about wedding dresses that keep popping up after your wedding). In other cases, your feed might have drifted somewhere that just doesn't feel good anymore — content that upsets you or that you simply don't want to see.

So resetting your algorithm isn't just about decluttering your feed. It's about taking control of your Instagram experience. I'd argue it's a really necessary feature as Instagram leans more and more into recommended content — and a genuinely useful way to make sure your feed is working for you, not against you.

As Instagram puts it, they want to give users "new ways to shape their Instagram experience, so it can continue to reflect their passions and interests as they evolve."

Why would you want to reset your algorithm?

There are plenty of reasons you might want to hit the reset button:

• Your interests have changed (so long, sourdough)
• You've been getting too much content on sensitive topics, which may cause distress
• You're tired of seeing the same types of posts over and over
• You accidentally fell down a rabbit hole of content you're not actually interested in
• You want to discover new creators and fresh perspectives

And if you're a creator or manage social media professionally, a reset can be a surprisingly useful research tool. Starting fresh gives you a cleaner look at what Instagram surfaces organically in your niche — without the noise of your own browsing history getting in the way.

The reset feature was developed as part of the platform’s evolving protections for Teen Accounts, which Instagram wants to help cultivate "safe, positive, age-appropriate experiences."

That said, the content reset feature is available for all users who feel that their feeds no longer reflect who they are.

How to reset your Instagram algorithm in 5 steps

Ready for that fresh start? Here's how to reset your Instagram recommendations:

1. From your profile, tap the three bars in the top right
2. Scroll down to the What you see section, and tap Content preferences
3. Tap Reset suggested content
4. Follow the on-screen instructions and tap Next
5. Tap Reset suggested content to confirm

Pro tip: Before you finalize the reset (at step 5 above), Instagram will give you the option to review the accounts you're following.

If you’re not sure you want a full reset and would prefer to remove certain accounts or add different ad topics, you can do that here, too.

What happens after you reset your Instagram algorithm?

Once you hit that reset button, Instagram essentially treats your account like a new user when it comes to recommendations. Your feeds won't be empty, though — Instagram will serve you a mix of content to explore in your explore, reels, and other recommended feeds.

As you interact with content by liking, sharing, or engaging with it, Instagram will begin personalizing your recommendations again based on these new signals.

Here’s a helpful way to visualize what it will be like: think moving to a new neighborhood while keeping all your furniture and friends.

Other ways to shape your Instagram experience

If you don’t fancy a full reset, there are still plenty of tools on Instagram that will help you be more intentional about curating your feeds.

Here are some other features you might want to try:

• Select Hide for content you'd rather skip (as above, you’ll find the option by tapping the three dots on a post in your feeds).
• Use Hidden Words to filter out posts with specific phrases (found in the same menu above, but under the How others can interact with you section).

• Switch to your Following feed to see posts chronologically (tap the Instagram logo on your home feed to switch).
• Create a Favorites list to prioritize content from accounts you love (found in the What you see section). Currently, you're able to curate a list of 50 favorites.

• Topic selection (for teens): If you're a teen (or a parent helping one), look into topic selection — Instagram lets teens in select countries choose topics they want to see more of, from books and travel to cooking and sports. It's a great way to shape recommendations without a full reset.

Ready for a reset?

Let’s go back to my spring cleaning analogy: you know how, when you clear out your closet, you rediscover clothes you love and haven’t worn in ages, or make space for a new style you’re thinking of trying.

It’s a bit like that. Sometimes, you don’t quite know what you need until you’ve taken stock of what you have.

That said, you'll need to be intentional about how you engage after the reset. Those first few days are important for training the algorithm on what you actually want to see. A few things to keep in mind:

• Like and comment on posts that genuinely interest you
• Skip past content you don't want more of — lingering sends a signal, even if you don't engage
• Follow new accounts that match the kind of content you want in your feed
• Use the favorites and hide options early on to give the algorithm a head start

Ready for that fresh start? Hit reset, be intentional about what you engage with in those first few days, and watch your feed rebuild into something that actually works for you.

The, it’s time to shape what comes next. With Buffer, you can plan and schedule content that aligns with your goals, so your Instagram works for you. Create your free account.

FAQ about the Instagram algorithm reset

What is an Instagram algorithm reset, in simple terms?

It’s a way to clear out your recommended content on Instagram so you can start fresh. Your explore page, reels, and home recommendations get reset, like you’re a brand-new user. It doesn’t delete anything — it just gives you a clean slate for what you see next.

What actually changes when you reset your Instagram algorithm?

Your recommendations are wiped and reset to default. That means explore, reels, and suggested posts will feel new again. Everything else — your followers, posts, messages, and ads — stays exactly the same.

Will I lose followers or posts if I reset my Instagram algorithm?

Nope, nothing like that. Your account stays intact, including your followers, content, and DMs. The reset only affects what Instagram shows you, not what you’ve already built.

Why would someone want to reset their Instagram feed?

Usually, it’s because their feed just doesn’t feel right anymore. Maybe your interests have changed, or you’ve fallen into a content rabbit hole you didn’t mean to. It’s a simple way to take back control and make your feed feel useful (and enjoyable) again.

How long does it take for Instagram to relearn your preferences?

Pretty quickly, actually. Within a few days of liking, skipping, and engaging with content, Instagram starts rebuilding your feed. The more intentional you are early on, the better your recommendations will get.

What should I do right after resetting my algorithm?

Be a little picky (in a good way). Engage with content you genuinely enjoy, and scroll past anything you don’t. Those first interactions send strong signals, so they really shape what your new feed becomes.

Can I reset my Instagram algorithm more than once?

Yes, you can. There’s no one-time limit on using the feature. That said, you probably won’t need to do it often if you’re actively shaping your feed as you go.

Does resetting help with mental health or screen habits?

It can. If your feed is filled with content that feels overwhelming or negative, a reset gives you a chance to start fresh. From there, you can intentionally build a space that feels more positive and aligned with what you need.

More Instagram resources

• 13 Ways to Get More Followers on Instagram (Tried & Tested)
• How the Instagram Algorithm Works
• Instagram Image Size Guide: Post, Story, and Reels Dimensions
• 26 Free Instagram Tools to Help Grow Your Account
• How to Make Money on Instagram: 12 Ideas for Creators and Small Businesses
• How to Get Verified on Instagram: 2 Ways to Get Your Blue Check
• Replying to Your Instagram Comments Can Boost Engagement by 21%
• Best Time to Post on Instagram: New Data from 9.6 Million Posts

Tap, tap. Hello, is anyone there? 🎤 Getting views on YouTube can feel like talking to an empty room — especially when you’re just starting out. But that feeling is more common than you’d think, and it doesn’t have to stick around.

And, with the right approach, getting more views on YouTube in 2026 is achievable — even if you’re just getting started.

In this article, I’ll share 13 tried-and-tested tips on how to get more views on YouTube. Whether you’re someone who just created their channel or you’ve been stuck on the same average viewership numbers for a while, there’s something here for everyone.

Key takeaways

• Prioritize ideas: Focus on topics that solve specific problems for your audience.
• Promote binge-watching: Organize videos into episodic series and playlists to create a TV show experience.
• Master the hook: Spend time on thumbnails, titles, and the first 30 seconds of the video to encourage people to actually click and watch
• Optimize for search engines: Use keywords in titles, descriptions, tags, and spoken dialogue.
• Use YouTube Shorts: Test new concepts and funnel viewers to long-form content.

1. Focus on your idea first 

It’s easy to get swept up in filming, editing, and thumbnails, without really spending much time and energy on your video idea itself. But beautiful sets, fancy thumbnails, and slick editing can’t make up for a weak video topic. 

You want to find video ideas that are familiar and unexpected. In other words, something they’re already interested in (familiar) but also something they want to learn more about (unexpected).

Great video ideas start with a deep understanding of your audience.  “You need to understand your ideal viewer,” says YouTube creator Cara Nicole.

“Ask yourself: What are they already interested in? How do they want to be talked to? What news and cultural trends are they paying attention to? That gives you a starting point for making videos that resonate.” 

There are plenty of ways to find content ideas for YouTube, but here are my three favorite ones (all beginner-friendly):

How to find great YouTube ideas

Good ol' Google

Search for a question your audience would look for on Google. If you’re a productivity creator, try searching ‘how to be productive’ on Google.”

Look for the ‘People also ask’ and ‘People also search for’ sections. These are real audience questions — and you might even find a ready-made title in them. 

You can take this further by searching for more specific questions your audience is asking.  For example, if you’re making videos for someone struggling to be productive while working from home, search for “how to be productive while working from home.” You’ll find plenty of ideas in the ‘People also ask’ and ‘People also search for’ sections. 

YouTube Trends 

In YouTube Studio, you’ll find a Trends tab under the Analytics section. Here, you’ll find ideas based on what your audience watches and what you’ve already posted.  Some of them might be a hit and miss, but you can find some inspiration, directly from YouTube.

Try typing a basic query into the YouTube search bar to see top keywords and how popular they are. You’ll also find some videos similar to the ones you’ve searched for below.

Comments and YouTube Community posts

This one’s simple: Listen to your audience and see what follow-up questions they have left on your videos. You can try this on other platforms too — not just YouTube.

If you’re new to YouTube and don’t have a lot of comments from your audience, do a competitor analysis and check the comment section of creators in your niche. What are the follow-up questions people have? These can be your future video ideas.

To find breakout ideas, go to a competitor’s profile, click Videos, then click on the Popular tab. These are the videos that outperformed the others. If it’s a topic you can make your own, it could be a winning idea for your channel.

Jade Beason, founder at Social People Agency, also suggests doing the same exercise using YouTube’s search bar: “Search broad topics around your niche and then filter it based on content shared within the last month or year (depending on how popular and time-sensitive your niche is),” she recommends.

“Then, look for any videos that received more views than the number of subscribers that the creator has. That’s a clear sign that it was pushed out by YouTube’s algorithm,” Jade says 

“Repeat this process to see if you can find any inspiration or patterns for your future video topics. But remember to use other creators’ videos for inspiration, not imitation.”

Similarly, if you have a tiny audience on YouTube already, you can also use the YouTube Community Posts to communicate with your audience and test content ideas.

For example, YouTuber Alina tested the waters about a topic with a community post on YouTube. Once there was enough interest, she turned it into a video.

How to make your YouTube ideas stand out

Of course, almost every niche on YouTube has a lot of creators in it — so standing out takes a little more intention.

“Analyze the market and then find your competitive edge,” recommends YouTuber Ali Abdaal. “Think in which domains can you stand out — for example, depth of research, storytelling, editing, relatability, or authenticity.”

This is consistent with what YouTube employee, Rene Ritchie, recommends, too: “What makes you different? What makes you interesting? If you're just going to copy what somebody else does — unless you can do it so significantly better that people will just rush to you — it's probably gonna be really hard,” he says. 

“But if you can figure out what makes you unique, I think there are just unlimited possibilities.”

A great example of this is Cleo Abrams. Her YouTube videos are all about optimistic tech. But her standout quality is the depth of research on every topic and the stunning animations.

Another way to stand out is to adapt a format from a different or adjacent niche into your YouTube videos.

“You can kind of take things over from different niches. Let's say it's golf. Are there any other niches that have a certain level of adjacency to golf? You can apply [similar] formats in so many niches,” says YouTuber Paddy Galloway. 

“It sounds simple, but so much of our success through my consulting company is by seeing what is working in different niches. What is a format that other people are not doing yet that we could bring over and adapt?”

For example, I spotted this video titled “the 1-page business plan that made me $200K+ in 2024” on my homepage. Here’s how creators from different niches could adapt this idea:

• Food creator: the 1 easy breakfast recipe that helped me reach my protein goal
• Productivity creator: the 1 productivity technique that saved me 5 hours a week
• Finance creator: the 1 financial advice that helped me save $10K in 2025

Your video ideas are the foundation of your YouTube channel. Before you worry about thumbnails or SEO (search engine optimization) tweaks, make sure your ideas are solid, and your unique edge is clear.

2. Think of your YouTube channel like a TV show

YouTube’s playlist feature is one of the best ways to encourage viewers to binge-watch your videos. But to use playlists, you have to think strategically and lay video topics on top of one another.

“I think people underestimate the power of viewer journeys. Someone comes in to watch your video. They should be able to watch 2, 3, or 4 videos immediately after that. Binging is probably the fastest way to grow a channel,” says Rene.

“If you start giving them a bunch of things that don't really relate to them, it's the equivalent of a TV show that doesn't have consistent episodes; it's always a different show.”

“If you create a video about how to fix your washing machine one day and how to fix your refrigerator the next week, it's very unlikely people are going to have those two problems back to back,” he explains with an example.

 “But if you create a series about how to fix your dishwasher, best parts to fix your dishwasher, how to make sure you don't need to fix your dishwasher, then people who watch those videos are going to have three, four videos to keep watching.”

Content series are an excellent way to keep your audience coming back for more on many social media platforms. And YouTube is no different. 

Take Cara Nicole’s financial audit series — I keep coming back to these because I want to know which character she’ll pick next, which concepts are consistent across multiple characters, etc. The arc builds and continues. I finish one and immediately want to watch the next.

“Once you’re publishing regularly, you can use analytics and comments to see what’s actually hitting. That’s how most of my series came about. I noticed one video concept was performing really well, and I expanded it into a playlist or recurring theme,” says Cara.

“Don’t expect to have a perfect content strategy from day one. Instead, start by making things your ideal viewer would care about. Then pay close attention to what’s working. Over time, you’ll find patterns that can evolve into signature series.”

Another great example is Makari Espe. She has multiple YouTube playlists on her channel, all of which are about different challenges she has undertaken to make her life better. 

Once you start watching, it’s hard not to click the next video — you want to see how she fares. It also helps that her video ideas are in that ‘familiar but unexpected’ category we talked about earlier.

So, while forming your YouTube strategy, think of related video topics that you can convert into an episodic series.

This will help you create a domino effect and get more views on your videos — especially if a single one in the series goes viral. It’s also a great strategy to build a loyal community and gain more subscribers on your channel.

3. Treat your thumbnails and titles like hooks

YouTube is a click-and-watch social media platform (except for YouTube Shorts). Unlike Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok, a video doesn’t automatically pop up in your feed while you’re scrolling. Instead, you have to make a decision to click the thumbnail and title that looks enticing to you.

“Your titles and thumbnails and concepts need to be sufficiently intriguing that someone actually clicks on the video,” says Ali.

Your video content could be excellent, but if the thumbnail and title don’t stop someone mid-scroll, they’ll never know. Every view — whether it comes from the homepage, suggested feed, or search — starts with that click.  Someone checks the thumbnail and the title to decide whether or not they want to watch your video.

“Most teams first make a video that they think is going to be great, then scramble to find a title and thumbnail. That’s completely backwards,” says Ryan Hashemi, who has managed many YouTube channels via his agency and led Jubilee’s YouTube channel to five billion views.

“If you don’t have a must-click title and thumbnail before you shoot, don’t make that video. 40% of your effort should just be focused on this one step, up-front.”

Take the case of one of Paddy’s clients, Tim Gabe. Paddy’s team tweaked the thumbnail of one of his most popular videos, and that video ended up getting 40 times more views per day.

Your video titles should include relevant keywords (more on that in a bit) — and use classic hooks to spark curiosity. 

Take a relatively newer channel, Smart Adjacent. All titles that Jonathan Huynh (creator behind the channel) uses are keywords people search for and tap into the curiosity gap.

(Also: Notice how he’s also leveraging the ‘think of it like a TV show’ tip we discussed earlier? When you watch one, you’re likely to watch another.)

The short of it: Making excellent YouTube videos isn’t enough to get more views. If you want to reach a broader audience, you must also pay equal attention to creating scroll-stopping thumbnails and curiosity-driven titles.

4. Add keywords in your title, description, tags, and subtitles

Viewers find your videos in search, home feed, or suggested videos. Your YouTube views can come from any of these places. But if you’re a new YouTube creator, it’s best to focus your efforts on search.

“It’s quite difficult to rank in YouTube’s algorithm on the homepage when you’re new,” says Jade. “If you’re answering a question and optimizing videos for search, you can still get a lot of views even if you don’t have a large audience.”

Now, to push your videos to rank higher, you need to do keyword research to understand what your audience is searching for and then add relevant keywords in your video.

How do you practice keyword research? First: Think like your audience. What keywords would you type in the search bar if you were in their shoes? What problems does your target audience face?

Next, use free SEO tools (or paid if you can!) to help you refine these keywords. YouTube’s own search bar can help, too. Type in a question and look at the auto-fill suggestions — those are long-tail keywords people are searching.” 

Try to find more long-tail keywords in your keyword research for YouTube — especially if you’re a new channel and/or in a competitive niche. Creating videos about niche problems your audience faces will help your videos rank higher and rack up more YouTube views.

Now, once you’ve done your keyword research, sprinkle relevant keywords in four places to rank higher in search results:

5. Hop on niche and platform-related trends

Trending content can act like a springboard to get more YouTube views, especially if you’re a new channel. YouTube, like any other social channel, pushes trending content at the front of viewers’ feeds.

“Trends are one of the best ways to get people in the door. When you’re new, audiences don’t know who you are yet, so attaching your content to something already getting attention (whether that’s a trending product, news story, or keyword people are searching for) gives you a natural boost,” says Cara.

“For me now, trends are still very helpful — I hear about a lot of them directly from my viewers in comments and DMs — but once you’ve built some trust with your audience, you also have more freedom to explore. You can experiment with topics that are a little less “searchable” but more original or aligned with your voice, because people are clicking for you and not just the topic.”

Use Google Trends to find trending keywords and create a new video targeting that term. People are likely searching for it, too, so don’t forget to optimize your video for SEO.

On Google Trends, you can select “YouTube Search” specifically to also see which keywords are seeing a rise on the platform.

There are also certain formats that become popular on YouTube.

 “Right now, very popular on YouTube is the ‘I tried it.’ I tried every hamburger. I tried every French fry. I tried every airplane. I tried every video game. There's someone who has some expertise in that topic, tries a variety of things, and rates them,” says Rene. 

“There's a variety of popular formats and you see those by just looking at popular videos on YouTube. See if any of those relate to you. Don't copy them, but see what inspiration they can give.”

You can spot these platform-centric trends by spending time on YouTube and monitoring content creators in the same niche — especially the mega-successful ones. The established creators often not only jump on trends early, but also sometimes create them for their respective niches.

But remember that doesn’t mean you should copy the big creators — only choose trends you can make your own. This is especially true if you’re in a lifestyle niche category.

“The biggest mistake I see creators making is that they copy other creators who are already big and have an audience. You can’t look at Emma Chamberlin and think you can create vlogs like ‘day in my life’ that aren’t wrapped in value,” Jade says. 

“If you’re starting out, you have to convince people to care about what you have to say and why they should watch your videos. Viewers don’t trust that your video content is valuable enough (yet) to just click on your video without any context.”

Another note when it comes to trending video content: Don’t rely too much on them to increase views on your videos. Yes, they’ll likely get more engagement, but your YouTube presence should have a mix of evergreen and trending videos.

“We usually think of trending content as the ‘entry point’ and evergreen videos as the ‘library’ that keeps viewers coming back. When a parenting trend spikes or a baby product launches, we create a timely video to capture search and suggested traffic. However, we always pair that with an evergreen topic we know will remain relevant several years later, such as developmental milestone guides or sleep training tips,” says co-founder of the Fathercraft channel, Paul Zalewski.

“This mix means we benefit from short-term spikes without creating a boom-and-bust cycle. Over the years, our evergreen videos have become a steady traffic backbone, with trending ones acting as growth accelerators.”

Long-form video content on YouTube has one of the highest shelf life in the social media world. You want to capitalize on this fact to get YouTube views not just today, but for years. If you create videos on evergreen topics, people will reference them for months (if not years).

6. Cross-promote your YouTube videos on other channels

If you already have a social presence on other social platforms — like Instagram or TikTok — use it to promote your channel and get more YouTube views. Cross-promoting is one of the easiest ways to reach more people who already like your content and are likely to subscribe to your channel.

For example, Bibi-Jane Angelica often promotes her YouTube channel by posting teasers from the full video as Instagram Reels.

And cross-promotion isn’t limited to social media. You can also promote your video via other digital marketing channels, such as blogs and email newsletters. At Buffer, we often promote relevant videos from our YouTube channel within our long-form blog content.

💡 Pro tip: A tool like Buffer can make this easier by letting you schedule and manage posts across multiple social platforms from one dashboard — so you can share teasers, behind-the-scenes clips, or links to your latest video without jumping between apps.

7. Repurpose your long-form videos for YouTube Shorts

Viewers on YouTube today enjoy YouTube Shorts as much as long-form video content. Shorts present an excellent opportunity to convert short-form video viewers into loyal subscribers.

“If you want to bring viewers to your long-form video, remember people won’t click through just because you want them to. You have to make them want to,” says Rene. “It’s a big deal for a viewer to move from a shorts video to a long video, so you have to make it worth it."

Some viewers just prefer to watch YouTube Shorts, so to make them switch, you have to work extra hard to tempt them. Many podcasts on YouTube do this by teasing snippets of the conversation in a YouTube Short, which makes viewers keen to know more.

You can also use these repurposed YouTube Shorts to promote your channel on  Instagram, TikTok, and other short-form video channels. 

And you can schedule all these short-form videos in one go using Buffer. It’s your all-in-one scheduler, so you can keep promoting your videos across an extended timeline instead of giving it a shout-out once and letting it collect dust.

YouTube Shorts are a great way to test ideas, too. “We are experimenting with ideas that could be long-form. It takes us at least a month to create a long-form video. The question is: Which idea should you spend your time on?” says creator Cleo. 

“One of the ways is exploring the idea as a short and then maybe make a long video [if it’s successful].”

Apart from the quantitative aspects of testing a short’s performance, pay attention to the comments. Are people engaging with the topic? Are they asking more questions? That might be a positive signal that it’s a good topic to explore with long-form videos.

If you can, edit your short clips to add a custom call-to-action — like “watch the full video to learn more” or “would you like to learn more on this topic?” — to give even more power to your YouTube Shorts.

Here are a few ways to turn your long-form videos into effective shorts

• Pull out a single, compelling moment. Look for a surprising fact, a funny reaction, or a strong opinion that stands on its own.
• Add a hook that points back to the full video. Something like 'This is just one of five mistakes — the full breakdown is on my channel' gives people a reason to click through.
• Don't just clip — reframe. A short works best when it feels intentional, not like a leftover. Re-edit the clip so it has its own beginning, middle, and end.

YouTube Shorts can attract more viewers and help you monetize via the Creator Pool and YouTube Partner Program (learn more about it in our guide to monetizing YouTube Shorts).

8. Collaborate with other creators in your niche

Collaborations are an easy way to get in front of more relevant viewers. Collaborating helps you reach new subscribers — and injects freshness into your content.

“We keep collaborations highly targeted, only appearing on channels where the audience closely matches ours. The primary objective is to ensure that the subscriber conversion rate is high,” says Paul. 

“I have realized that cross-promotion works best when we each create unique-value-driven content for the other's audience rather than just swapping shout-outs.”

I agree: I’ve watched some plain shout-out videos that feel more like barter YouTube ads than authentic collaborations.

My favorite example of how to do creator partnerships right is the collaboration between booktubers Haley Pham, Sara Carrolli, and Destiny Sidwell. They met in person to swap their five-star reads, and each creator posted a unique video to their channel, helping them reach new viewers.

Now, you don’t need to meet in person to collaborate with another creator — it’s difficult if you want to partner with creators across the world and reach a global audience. Instead, each of you can shoot your segments and stitch them together. The goal is to make the collab feel fun, authentic, and creative.

Not sure where to start? Here are a few ways to find collaboration partners

• Look for creators with a similar audience size. You don't need to pitch a creator with millions of subscribers. Creators around your level are more likely to say yes — and the audience crossover tends to be stronger.
• Start in the comments. Engage genuinely on other creators' videos in your niche. Building a real connection first makes a collab pitch feel natural, not transactional.
• Pitch a clear concept. Instead of a vague 'we should collab,' come with a specific video idea that benefits both audiences. It shows you've thought it through and makes it easier for them to say yes.

9. Use YouTube cards and end screens

Cards are the videos recommended midway to viewers, and end screens are videos recommended at the end of a video.

These are excellent places to promote other videos in your channel. It goes back to the TV show concept we talked about — redirect viewers to what they should watch next in your channel and help them easily find related videos.

10. Analyze your YouTube analytics

Your YouTube analytics are a goldmine of ways to improve performance. Pay attention to your:

• Click-through rate: A lower click-through rate (but higher impressions) suggests that your title and thumbnail need improvement.
• Watch time: Check where exactly viewers drop off the most — analyze what you can improve to keep people hooked in that moment and implement what you learn in future videos.
• Where people find your videos: See the traffic source to understand where most of your YouTube views come from — homepage, search results, suggested videos.
• Audience: See the demographics of your subscribers, returning viewers, unique new monthly viewers, and a lot more.

💡 Pro tip: If you manage multiple platforms alongside YouTube, tools like Buffer can pull your analytics into one place so you're not jumping between tabs to piece the picture together.

11. Engage your audience early on

The first 30 or so seconds of your video have a significant influence on your overall video’s performance. YouTube typically counts a view after a viewer watches for a "legitimate" amount of time, often estimated to be around 30 seconds. If you're like most viewers, you'll also decide whether or not you want to keep watching after just a few seconds.

“For us, one of the turning points was refining the first 30 seconds of each video. We mainly focused on scripting concise, empathetic intros that immediately addressed the viewer's pain point,” says Paul. 

Note that this only applies to long-form YouTube videos; shorts views count the number of times your short starts to play or replay with no minimum watch time requirement.

Here are a few tried-and-tested ways to hook viewers right from the start

• Lead with the payoff. Tell viewers exactly what they'll get from watching, and why it matters to them. Skip lengthy introductions about yourself.
• Open with a bold statement or question. Something like 'Most productivity advice is wrong — here's why' immediately creates a reason to keep watching.
• Show a preview of the best moment. A quick flash of the most exciting or surprising part of your video can build enough curiosity to keep people around.
• Acknowledge the viewer's problem. Starting with 'If you've ever struggled with…' signals that the video is made for them.

While the first 30 seconds are crucial, don’t forget to edit your complete videos with great care and attention to keep viewers hooked till the end.

“The single most important thing for me has been respecting my audience’s time. That means getting to the point quickly (don’t bury your main idea three minutes in) and cutting the fluff (avoid repeating yourself or dragging out tangents),” says Cara.

“I write all of my videos as full scripts. It’s basically like writing an essay: I start with a hook and thesis, then break it into three main points or “body paragraphs,” and finish with a conclusion. That structure makes sure everything feels tight and purposeful, rather than rambling. On top of that, I weave in my own voice — humor, commentary, little asides — because personality keeps people engaged just as much as information does.”

12. Post when your viewers are online

Sharing a video right when your audience is online is an easy way to collect more YouTube views.

When it comes to the best time to post on YouTube, the data becomes a little more interesting when we compare the best time to post long-form content vs. YouTube Short. Get this: YouTube long-form videos and YouTube Shorts have almost opposite peak times — morning hours for long-form; and evenings for shorts.

You can see how this plays out in the heatmaps below:

While long-form videos perform best in the mornings between around 8 a.m. and 11 a.m. , YouTube Shorts engagement peaks in the evenings — generally between 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. 

The best day of the week to post long-form YouTube videos is Sunday, followed by Tuesday and then Monday. The best day to post YouTube Shorts is Friday, followed by Saturday and then Thursday.

The key takeaway here is that audiences generally engage with long-form videos and shorts at different times, which makes sense considering how different the formats and functionality are.

Of course, your ideal posting time will depend on your specific audience. Click on YouTube Studio's Analytics, click the Audience tab, then check out the section on When your viewers are on YouTube.

💡 Pro tip: If you want to make sure you never miss that window, a scheduling tool like Buffer lets you plan and queue your YouTube uploads ahead of time.

13. Remember, YouTube is a long game

Honestly, YouTube might be one of the most difficult channels to grow on, simply because long-form video content requires more effort to create, edit, and promote. Comparatively, Instagram and TikTok offer quick(er) wins.

But YouTube is also one of the best social networks to grow on because it’s been around for ages and it’s not going anywhere either. It’s a social platform and search engine rolled into one, and the content you create here garners views for much longer than other platforms.

“YouTube isn’t something you dip a toe into. It rewards consistency and compounds significantly over time, ” says Ryan.

YouTube is one of those platforms that demands real patience — but what you build here compounds in a way most other platforms can't match. The key is consistency, not perfection. Keep showing up.

And if it feels a little too overwhelming, grab some quick wins and lessons by posting consistently on YouTube Shorts. Use Buffer to plan, repurpose, and schedule your videos. Start for free.

FAQ about YouTube views

How do I get more views on YouTube?

The best-performing videos solve a specific problem your audience actually cares about, packaged with a strong title and thumbnail that earns the click. From there, focus on keeping people watching — especially in the first 30 seconds — and guiding them to more of your videos through playlists and end screens.

How do I get more views on YouTube Shorts?

Think of shorts as a discovery tool. Hook attention immediately, focus on one clear idea, and give viewers a reason to care within the first few seconds. The real magic happens when you connect shorts to your longer videos — teasing just enough to make people curious to click through.

How much does YouTube pay per view?

There’s no fixed rate per view — it depends on factors like your niche, audience location, and how many viewers actually see ads. Most creators earn through ad revenue tied to 1,000 views (called RPM), rather than individual views. That’s why two channels with the same views can earn very different amounts. Here's how to make money on YouTube as a creator.

How much do 1,000 YouTube views pay?

“Estimates vary widely depending on niche, audience, and ad rates, but many creators report RPMs ranging from a few cents to several dollars. Your actual earnings depend on your niche, audience, content type, and how many ads are shown.

Keep in mind you need to qualify for the YouTube Partner Program before you can earn from ads. That means hitting 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours in the past 12 months, or 10 million YouTube Shorts views in the last 90 days.

How many YouTube views per day is considered good?

Good is relative to where you are right now. What matters most is whether your views are trending upward over time. Progress beats comparison here, every time.

More YouTube resources

• How to Create Scroll-stopping YouTube Thumbnails (+ Tips from Top
• 25 Creative YouTube Shorts Ideas for Your Next Video
• 2 Ways to Schedule YouTube Shorts — For Free
• The 11 Best AI Video Editors for Creators and Marketers, Tried and Tested (+ Bonus AI Tool)
• Guide to the YouTube Algorithm (+ 7 Ways to Boost Your Content)

I don't use AI image generators in my creative process — or at least, I didn't before writing this article. Every time I tried to think of a reason to generate an image, my brain went straight to photorealism.

And then I'd think: why wouldn't I just pick up my phone and take a picture of the thing? But it turns out, I was only considering one slice of what these tools can do.

I'm not particularly artistic. Here's the evidence:

I can write. I can build a (pretty good, if I do say so myself) carousel in Canva or even Figma. But I can't draw, and I can't create the kind of illustrations I see other creators using across their content. That turned out to be exactly the gap where AI image generators are most useful — not replacing photography, but creating visuals I couldn't make on my own.

So I tested nine of them through that lens, focusing on the use cases where these tools actually solve a problem. Everything I learned about writing prompts that work, which tools performed best, and the AI image generators worth knowing about in 2026 is here.

Key Takeaways

• Nano Banana 2 (Google) was the most consistent performer overall. It nailed illustration accuracy, came closest to photorealism, and handled typography well. If you only try one model, start there.
• Every tool struggled with photorealism in some way. None produced an image I'd confidently pass off as a real photo without editing, especially when the prompt included brand names or device screens.
• Typography was the biggest divider. Seedream and Ideogram 3.0 were the most reliable at spelling and placing text. Others, like Midjourney and GPT Image, garbled words or skipped them entirely.
• Your prompt structure matters more than your tool choice. Leading with the subject (not the style), using photography language for realism, and describing colors in plain words instead of hex codes made a noticeable difference across every model.
• I ran most of my tests inside Leonardo.ai because it gives you access to multiple models in one place and integrates directly with Canva — which is where I do all my visual design work.
• AI-generated images are commercially usable, but they're not copyrightable yet. If you're building a brand around original visuals, that's worth factoring in.

What makes a good AI image prompt?

When I first sat down to test every tool in this article, I blanked completely. The generators have gotten absurdly good, especially in the past year. But I couldn't think of a single image I needed.

I think that's where most people get stuck. The tools aren't the bottleneck anymore. Knowing what to ask for is.

So I spent time researching before I started testing. I read through creator communities on Reddit (r/midjourney and r/StableDiffusion are goldmines for this), studied prompt breakdowns on Instagram, and went through Envato's illustration prompt guide. Then I ran dozens of prompt variations across every tool on this list. A clear pattern emerged in what works and what doesn't.

Start with the subject, not the style

The first few words of your prompt carry the most weight. Every tool I tested responded better when I led with what's in the image before describing how it should look. "A woman sitting at a desk with a laptop open" before "editorial lifestyle photography, warm natural light."

When I flipped the order and led with style, the results lost focus. The model seemed to treat the style as the priority and get vague about the actual content.

Use camera language for photorealism

"Shallow depth of field." "Shot from a slight angle." "Soft golden hour lighting." "35mm film photography."

Photography terms are the single most effective way to get photorealistic results, because these models were trained on image captions and photography descriptions. They understand camera vocabulary natively. Vague descriptors like "beautiful" or "high quality" do almost nothing.

Describe colors in words, not codes

I tested the same prompt with hex codes and with plain descriptions ("light blue," "butter yellow"). The descriptive version was more accurate in the majority of tools I tested.

This one has some nuance, though. The Envato guide recommends hex codes for brand accuracy, and some tools (particularly ones built for designers, like Recraft) handle them better than others. If you're not sure, start with descriptive color names. If you're working with a specific brand palette and a design-focused tool, try the hex codes and see what you get.

Anchor your illustration style or the tool will choose for you

This was the biggest lesson from the illustration tests. When I prompted for photorealism, the tools mostly knew what I meant. When I switched to illustration, the results fell apart until I got specific about what kind.

"Hand-drawn doodle, light blue ink, single color, simple line art with slightly wobbly quality, outlines only" gave me something usable. Without those anchors, most tools defaulted to either photorealism or something that looked like free clip art from 2008.

The Envato guide breaks illustration styles into specific technique language: "ink hatching, gouache blocks, flat vector shapes, stipple shading, gestural linework." The more precise you are about the medium and technique, the closer the output gets to what you actually pictured.

Tell the tool what you don't want

Negative prompts are underrated. Adding "no watermark," "no text," "no photorealism" to my illustration prompts cleaned up the outputs noticeably. But they only work when the core prompt is already solid. You can't subtract your way to a good image from a vague starting point.

Put your most important exclusions early in the negative prompt. "No photorealism, no watermarks, no text" performed better than burying those instructions at the end.

A template you can steal

Here's the structure that worked consistently across the tools I tested:

[Subject and what they're doing] + [setting or context] + [2 or more specific details] + [style]

And here are the prompts I came up with.

For illustration:

A sticker sheet of hand-drawn doodle illustrations on a butter yellow background, with generous spacing between every object so each can be cropped as an individual sticker. Exactly these objects and nothing else: 1) a structured clutch bag with clasp hardware, 2) a tall oval perfume bottle with a label reading "Orpheon", 3) chunky lace-up trail running sneakers, 4) wireless square transparent over-ear headphones with absolutely no wire and no earbud attached completely standalone, 5) angular rectangular sunglasses, 6) a leather zip-up moto biker jacket with zippered pockets, 7) an anthurium plant with large waxy leaves and a spadix, 8) an open laptop computer, 9) a smartphone with a screen, 10) a single hot steaming cup of tea in a teacup on a saucer no iced drinks, no straws, no second cup, 11) an open journal with handwritten lines on the pages, 12) a flat neat stack of magazines with spines reading Kinfolk, Dazed, i-D, 13) a plain simple canvas tote bag with handles not mesh, not net. Light blue line art on butter yellow background, single color, simple wobbly hand-drawn line art, outlines only, zero shading, zero fill, zero color blocks. Flat lay arrangement.

For photorealism:

A photorealistic image of an iPhone resting on a light marble surface, screen facing up, showing a colorful Instagram feed. A small iced coffee in a clear cup and a sprig of eucalyptus beside it. Three-quarter overhead angle, soft natural window light from the right, gentle shadows. Clean, styled, editorial product photography. No people, no hands, no text overlays, no watermarks.

For typography as design:

Square graphic. The phrase 'Brand Partnerships 101' rendered as colorful embroidery stitching on light blue linen fabric background. Letters in butter yellow thread with visible stitch texture, cross-stitch style. Small decorative floral embroidery accents in coral and white thread flanking the 📸text. Fabric has subtle woven texture. Warm, tactile, handcrafted feel. No photographs of real objects, no watermarks.

You'll see how each model handled these prompts (and where they fell apart) in the reviews below.

The nine best AI image generators

I tested nine AI image generation models across three prompts: a hand-drawn doodle sticker sheet, a styled product flat lay, and an embroidered typography graphic.

Some of these are models (the AI that generates the image), and some are platforms (where you access the model). Rather than trying multiple tools across different websites, I used Leonardo.ai as my testing hub for the models available there, testing the most recent version of each. Then I tested Midjourney, Recraft, and Adobe Firefly as standalone tools.

I picked Leonardo.ai because of its Canva integration — I can seamlessly add the images into my Canva and edit them from there, so this is a plus for my workflow. You don’t have to use it, go for any all-in-one image generator of your choice that suits your workflow (Recraft is another great option).

If you only try one or two models: Nano Banana 2 delivered the most accurate results across all three test categories. For text-heavy graphics, start with Seedream. For the most artistic, visually rich outputs, Recraft’s models have a quality that other tools can't match.

Now, the results.

Midjourney

Best for: Creators who want artistic, mood-driven visuals and don't need precise text or highly specific object rendering.

Midjourney has a reputation as the "artistic" AI image generator, and the visual richness of its outputs backs that up. The editing experience is button-based: you can vary elements to be subtle or strong, lean more creative, and even animate your results without leaving the tool.

How it handled illustration: Of the four images Midjourney generated from my sticker sheet prompt, only one was close to usable. Midjourney struggles with this level of detail and specificity. When you're listing 13 distinct objects with particular characteristics (a clutch with clasp hardware, transparent over-ear headphones, magazines with specific spine text), it can't keep up. The objects it did render looked good individually, but it missed the brief.

How it handled photorealism: The overall composition and photography feel were strong. The layout, the lighting, the general mood of the image landed well. But the details fell apart: the "iced coffee" had no ice (just an ambiguous glass of something), and the Instagram feed on the phone screen was warped beyond recognition. Midjourney builds a beautiful scene and then fumbles the specifics inside it.

How it handled typography: This is where Midjourney hit a wall. It spelled "brand" correctly and got "101" right, but "partnerships" was garbled. The embroidery stitching itself looked genuinely handcrafted, maybe even the best texture of the bunch. But when your competitor tools are nailing the text on the first try, beautiful stitching on misspelled words doesn't cut it.

Adobe Firefly 5

Best for: Creators already in the Adobe ecosystem who want clean commercial licensing and don't mind working around brand-name restrictions.

Adobe Firefly 5 is the latest image-generation model from Adobe, and its biggest selling point is its workflow integration. If you're already in Photoshop or Illustrator, you can generate an image and move it straight into your editing workspace. Adobe has also been vocal about training Firefly on licensed and public-domain content, which means you get cleaner commercial-use rights than most competitors.

I don't use Photoshop or Illustrator in my day-to-day, but if they're part of your workflow, the direct handoff alone might make Firefly worth trying.

How it handled illustration: The hand-drawn illustrations had a whimsical quality to them and felt truly hand-drawn. There were some attempts at making things feel "human-generated," like scribbles on the page, which was a nice touch. But the accuracy wasn't there: the leather jacket had zipper placements at the collar and bottom that were visibly wrong, and a few other objects felt approximated rather than intentional.

How it handled photorealism: This is where Firefly's copyright-conscious training showed up in a way I wasn't expecting.

It declined the words "iPhone" and "Instagram" in the prompt, which aligns with how Adobe avoids potential trademark issues. That's worth knowing upfront: if your prompt references specific brand names or products, Firefly might push back.

How it handled typography: The embroidery prompt was one of Firefly's better results. The fabric behind the text looked realistically aged and worn, the text itself was legible and well-generated, and there was genuine depth to the stitching. You could see the texture in a way that some of the other tools didn't quite achieve.

Recraft V4 Pro

Best for: Creators and designers who want serious control over visual style and want access to Recraft's reference and refinement features.

Recraft is another tool I tested as a standalone platform. It has a massive library of existing designs from real designers that you can use as reference images. You can assign a color palette, select from a wide range of visual styles, and work with its agentic chat to refine your images through conversation rather than re-prompting from scratch.

If you're not tied to Canva for your design workflow, Recraft is a genuinely solid all-in-one option. The ability to pull from its existing design library as reference images could save you a lot of back-and-forth if you already have a visual direction in mind.

I chose not to use any reference images from Recraft's library for this experiment, but it's something that could get you to better results faster.

How it handled illustration (using the Vector Pro model): The images had that hand-drawn quality I was going for. Objects like the plant and the coffee cup looked right. But inconsistencies crept in: the sneakers felt generic, and the laptop suddenly introduced a color that nothing else in the image had. Because Recraft lets you layer in visual styles and references, I think the gap between "first attempt" and "polished result" is smaller here than with other tools. I just didn't take those extra steps for this test.

How it handled photorealism (using the V4 Pro model): At a glance, the image looked photorealistic. The objects cast very realistic shadows and the condensation detail on the iced coffee caught my attention. But zooming in told a different story: the phone dimensions looked off, the camera was on the front of the device, the on-screen images were gibberish, and the table was sinking into the wall.

How it handled typography: Recraft went its own direction here. It didn't deliver the embroidery realism I asked for, but what it did produce had a clear aesthetic vision and a handcrafted feel that I could actually see myself using. I'd dock points for not following the brief, but then I’d have to add them back for creativity. Sometimes a tool that ignores your prompt gives you something better than what you asked for.

GPT Image 1.5 (OpenAI)

Best for: People already using ChatGPT who want quick image generation without switching tools. For more control, access the same model via an all-in-one image generator tool such as Leonardo.ai or Recraft.

If you've used image generation inside ChatGPT recently, you've likely used a version of this model. I tested GPT Image 1.5 inside Leonardo.ai, the first of the models on this list where I did this. You can dig deeper into style selection (illustration, photography, etc.), adjust quality settings, and control image dimensions. The model itself is the same underlying technology, but tools like Leonardo give you more knobs to turn.

How it handled illustration: This was not GPT Image's strongest showing. The sticker images looked almost compressed, probably because the spacing I requested between objects resulted in a lot of empty space that the model didn't know how to handle. The whole image also had that yellowish tinge that's become a recognizable "this is AI" tell. Other tools rendered the butter yellow background without that filter-like quality.

How it handled photorealism: It came closer than the illustration prompt, but the Instagram feed on the phone screen was missing the visible branding and layout cues that make it recognizable as Instagram.

How it handled typography: GPT Image leaned hard into the cross-stitch texture, which was technically what I asked for. It followed the prompt more faithfully than several other tools, and the execution was accurate. But the result wasn't something I'd use in my content. If prompt adherence matters more than aesthetics for your use case, GPT Image delivers on that.

Nano Banana 2 (Google)

Best for: Creators who want the most accurate rendering of specific real-world objects and styles, particularly for illustration work.

Nano Banana 2 is a Google model, and I have a theory about why it outperformed several competitors: Google has the search engine. It has image search, Google Shopping, and years of indexed visual data. When I asked for a "Diptyque Orphéon" perfume bottle or "chunky trail running sneakers from Salomon," Nano Banana seemed to actually know what those things look like. Other tools freestyled the details. This one got the closest to reality.

How it handled illustration: This was my top pick for the illustration prompt. The hand-drawn style landed, the proportions were correct, and nothing felt off. It got the style of the perfume bottle right, matched the sneaker aesthetic I was going for, and even rendered the magazine spines with fonts and imagery that felt close to the real publications. With reference images, I think this would get even closer, but even without them, Nano Banana 2 delivered the most complete sticker sheet of the group.

How it handled photorealism: Nano Banana came closest to generating a realistic Instagram feed, and the phone itself felt more believable than other tools' attempts. It did something interesting, though: it added elements I hadn't asked for (a small notebook, a pair of earbuds near the edge of the frame) that made the scene feel lived-in. That instinct for "what would actually be on this desk" pushed the image past the sterile quality that plagued other results.

How it handled typography: The embroidery text came out whimsical and stylized, with visible texture on both the fabric and the stitching. The overall feel was one of my preferred outputs from the group. The flowers and surrounding design elements had a cohesive quality that matched the text treatment, which not every tool managed.

Seedream (ByteDance)

Best for: Creators who need reliable text generation in their images and access within CapCut.

Seedream is ByteDance's image generation model and bonus: you can use it if you have CapCut Pro. It had some interesting strengths and some familiar weaknesses.

How it handled illustration: Seedream produced the most sticker-like effect of any tool, which was exactly the brief. But accuracy issues showed up on closer inspection: a phone appeared on the magazine stack (not requested), the headphones were transparent (not requested), and the perfume bottle didn't quite match the description. But text generation was spot-on. Every label, every spelling, every piece of text in the image was correct. It also correctly rendered an anthurium instead of defaulting to a monstera, which tripped up several other tools.

How it handled photorealism: The phone was the weak point: it was clearly not a real device. But the surrounding elements held up. The shadows were well-placed, the coffee cup was good (it even looked like a latte, more specific than what I asked for), and the overall scene had decent styling.

How it handled typography: Seedream did well here. The fabric texture behind the text looked realistic, and it got most of the prompt elements right. The font weight felt slightly cartoonish compared to the fabric realism, and it rendered "partnerships" across two lines, which didn't come up with other tools. But I could see myself using this in my content, which is more than I can say for some of the other outputs.

Ideogram 3.0

Best for: Creators who want accurate text in their generated images and are willing to trade visual personality for spelling precision.

Ideogram 3.0 is the latest model from Ideogram that is positioned as being great at generating images with text, but I found that it only got 75% of the way there in some of my requests.

How it handled illustration: The colors were off: the yellow was deeper than requested and there was no blue in the image. The illustrations themselves were generic, with very little of the hand-drawn personality I was going for. It gave me something closer to a monstera when I asked for an anthurium, which is a specific enough request that getting it wrong felt like the model was pattern-matching to "houseplant" rather than following the prompt. With reference images, this probably improves. Without them, the first-pass results were underwhelming.

How it handled photorealism: The image had that uncanny valley quality at a glance where other tools needed a bit more attention. The coffee looked slightly fake in a way that's easy to pinooint as AI. The shadows and lighting were actually good, with a nice play of light across the objects. But the overall impression was "almost real," which in photorealism is the same as "not real."

How it handled typography: Ideogram went for a cartoonish take on the embroidery, with an interesting attempt at making the fabric look like it was being pulled by the weight of the stitching. The effect didn't land for me. It felt tool-generated rather than handcrafted, which is the opposite of what this prompt was testing for. Other tools leaned into the realism of cross-stitch. Ideogram leaned into a stylized interpretation.

FLUX.2 Pro

Best for: Creators who want a model that takes creative liberties with prompts and produces outputs with a distinct point of view. Less predictable, but occasionally surprising in a good way.

FLUX.2 Pro is another model available inside Leonardo.ai. It's been gaining attention in the AI image generation space for its balance of quality and speed.

How it handled illustration: FLUX did something I wasn't expecting. Instead of generating flat sticker illustrations on a background, it created what looked like printed-out stickers that had been physically laid on a surface. Illustrated on a computer, printed, cut out, arranged, photographed. The model found its own middle ground between illustration and photorealism. The hand-drawn feel was there, but I wished the stickers sat flatter against the background so they'd look more natural when cropped. Some object details were off (the perfume bottle, the anthurium plant), but the overall approach was creative.

How it handled photorealism: FLUX handled shadows well and even added branding to the coffee cup (which I hadn't asked for, but it wasn't unwelcome). The phone was much closer to reality than the images from other models, but still not what I'd reach for if I needed a convincing flat lay image.

How it handled typography: When you zoom into FLUX's embroidery image, the stitching texture is genuinely impressive. It looks like real thread. But the text itself looked slightly glued on rather than stitched into the fabric, like someone had created embroidered letters separately and placed them on the background. The colors were also slightly more washed out than other models.

Lucid Origin

Best for: Creators who want quick generation with a distinctive dimensional quality and don't need pixel-perfect prompt adherence.

Lucid Origin offers both fast and ultra generation modes, plus a more limited set of style options compared to some other models on the platform. The ultra mode adds more detail but takes longer.

How it handled illustration: At first glance, the sticker sheet looked fine. On closer inspection, the text generation was poor compared to other models, and several requested objects didn't quite match the prompt. On the positive side, the stickers had an almost 3D quality that was visually interesting, like they had a slight embossed effect. If that dimensional look appeals to you, Lucid Origin delivers it naturally.

How it handled photorealism: This was one of the few tools that actually interpreted "flat lay" literally. Where other tools generated a three-quarter overhead shot, Lucid Origin went full top-down, which was closer to what the prompt language described. Points for reading comprehension. But the ice in the cup, phone content and on-screen images looked deeply unrealistic, more so than most competitors.

How it handled typography: I liked what Lucid Origin generated here. The colors were nice and the embroidery had a slightly raised quality that could work as a stylistic choice. It doesn't feel as grounded in physical reality as some of the other outputs, but for a creator who wants something that reads as "inspired by embroidery" rather than "trying to look like real embroidery," this is a viable option. It didn't nail every element (the white accents I asked for were missing), but the overall aesthetic was appealing.

FAQs

What is the best AI image generator overall?

Nano Banana 2 (Google's model) was the most consistent performer across all three of my test prompts. It handled illustration, photorealism, and typography well, and it seemed to understand the specific objects and brands I referenced better than other models.

I tested it inside Leonardo.ai, which I'd recommend as a starting point since it gives you access to multiple models in one platform. If you're already in the Adobe ecosystem, Firefly 5 is worth trying for the workflow integration and cleaner copyright positioning. And if you want the most artistic, visually rich outputs, Midjourney still has a distinct quality that other tools can't match, as long as you don't need accurate text.

How do AI image generators work?

Every AI image generator on this list works by turning text into pixels, but they don't all do it the same way. Understanding the basics helps explain why the same prompt can look completely different across two tools.

There are two main approaches powering the tools in this article.

Diffusion models start with visual noise (think: TV static) and gradually remove it, step by step, until an image forms. Each step, the model looks at your prompt and nudges the noise a little closer to what you described. FLUX, Stable Diffusion, and Midjourney all use variations of this approach. It's why these tools tend to produce images with a painterly or textured quality, and why they're often strong with artistic styles. They're building the whole image at once, refining it from chaos into clarity.

Autoregressive models work more like writing a sentence. They generate the image piece by piece, predicting what comes next based on what they've already created. Google's Imagen (the technology behind Nano Banana 2) and OpenAI's GPT Image models use this approach. These models tend to be better at following complex, detailed prompts because they process the image sequentially rather than all at once.

In practice, the line between these two categories is blurring. Some tools combine both approaches, and newer models like Seedream and Ideogram use hybrid architectures that are harder to categorize neatly. You don't need to know which approach a tool uses before you try it. But if you're wondering why Nano Banana 2 followed my 13-item sticker sheet more faithfully than FLUX did, or why Midjourney produces that distinctive artistic quality even when you ask for something simple, the underlying architecture is a big part of the answer.

One more thing worth knowing: these models learn from images and their descriptions. That's why photography terms work so well in prompts (the training data is full of photo captions) and why specific illustration vocabulary like "ink hatching" or "gouache blocks" gets better results than "make it look drawn." You're speaking the language the model was trained on.

Can I use AI images in my content?

You can use AI-generated images commercially. Every tool in this article allows it in their terms of service. But there are a few things worth knowing before you start publishing them.

AI-generated images aren't copyrightable (yet). The U.S. Copyright Office has ruled that typing a prompt doesn't make you the legal author of the output. In March 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to change this. For most creators, this won't affect your day-to-day. You're putting these in social posts and blog headers, not licensing them. But it means if someone else generates something similar, you can't claim ownership the way you would with a photo you took. The more you modify and integrate an AI image into your own design work, the stronger your position gets.

The tools are trained on other people's art. Most models in this article learned from large datasets of images scraped from the internet, and over 70 copyright lawsuits are currently making their way through the courts. The biggest one, which names both Stability AI and Midjourney, goes to trial in September 2026. Adobe Firefly is the exception: it's trained on licensed Adobe Stock content and public domain material, and Adobe offers IP indemnification for enterprise plans. If clean sourcing matters to you, Firefly has the strongest case.

Be careful with people. I chose not to generate images of human subjects for this article. These tools can produce convincing images of people who don't exist, and some can produce images that resemble real people. That opens up right-of-publicity risks and ethical questions that go beyond copyright. If your content involves AI-generated people, that's a decision worth thinking through.

Are AI image generators free?

Most tools on this list offer a free tier or free credits to start. Leonardo.ai gives you daily tokens that refresh, so you can test multiple models without paying. Recraft, Ideogram, and Meta AI all have free access. Midjourney requires a paid subscription (plans start at $10/month). Adobe Firefly is included with most Creative Cloud plans, and you can generate a limited number of images for free through Adobe's website. ChatGPT includes image generation on its free plan, though paid plans give you faster generation and higher limits.

If you're trying to figure out which tool works for you before spending anything, Leonardo.ai is the best starting point because you can test multiple models in one place without a subscription.

What's the best AI image generator for social media graphics?

It depends on what kind of graphics you're making. For illustrated elements you want to drop into Canva (stickers, doodles, branded illustrations), Nano Banana 2 and Recraft were the strongest in my testing. For photorealistic product shots or lifestyle flat lays, Nano Banana 2 and FLUX.2 Pro produced the most convincing results, though every tool in this list still struggles with fine details on zoom. For text-heavy graphics like quote cards or typography-based designs, Seedream and Ideogram 3.0 had the most reliable text generation, while Midjourney consistently misspelled words.

Can AI image generators put text on images?

Some can, some can't. This was one of the biggest dividers in my testing. Seedream and Ideogram 3.0 nailed the spelling and placement of text across all three prompts. Adobe Firefly 5 handled it well. Midjourney struggled badly with anything beyond short, simple words. If accurate text matters for your use case (and for most social media graphics, it does), check the typography results in each tool's review above before choosing.

Do AI-generated images look obviously AI?

It depends on the type of image. For illustration and stylized graphics like embroidery or sticker sheets, no. The best outputs from my tests were genuinely usable in content without any obvious AI tells. For photorealism, yes, usually on closer inspection. Phone screens, text within the image, and small product details are the giveaways. The gap is closing fast, but we're not at "indistinguishable from a real photo" yet.

More resources

• 14 AI tools for social media content creation: my workflow guide — the AI tools I actually use for creating social content, from ideation to publishing
• The 11 best AI video editors for creators and marketers — tried and tested video editing tools for creators who want to work faster
• The top 10 AI writing tools I recommend as a professional writer — writing tools that pair well with the visual assets you generate
• 8 of the best AI productivity tools — tools to optimize how you work across your whole content workflow

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Choosing the right trending audio to accompany your latest Instagram post is an art, not a science. Still, opting for a trending sound or music clip could provide the boost you need to get your video on the Instagram Explore page or Instagram Reels feed.

While it used to be just for Instagram Reels, you can now also add trending audio to your carousels and single photo posts. This gives your posts a better chance of landing on the Explore page, and it makes carousels and photos eligible to appear on the reels feed, too. That opens up a new way to expand your reach.

But where can you find trending audio on Instagram? If you feel like you’re always chasing the tail-end of trending songs on the app, you’ve come to the right place.

Here are some of the most viral, versatile, trending songs and sounds on Instagram right now.

13 trending songs and audio on Instagram

Here's a quick summary of what is trending in April 2026.

1. PINKY UP

KATSEYE's new song is all over Instagram right now. It’s high-energy and built around punchy percussion and bold synths that make it perfect for a dance challenge. The “pinky up” move is the main event, with creators either putting their own spin on it or recreating KATSEYE’s original choreography.

🎧 Get the audio

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Tinie T (@iamtiniet)

2. Sunny

Boney M.'s classic track is the soundtrack to the “the office is on fire — grab what matters” trend, where creators (and brands) hilariously prioritize the essentials: coffee machines, desk plants, snack stashes, and oddly specific collectibles. It’s a great way for brands to show personality without trying too hard.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Wando High School (@wandohighschool)

3. YAHWEH

YAHWEH bringing a fresh wave of feel-good energy to Instagram — part of what Forrest Frank calls "Christian music that feels like summer." It’s got an easy, reggae-inspired rhythm, and creators are pairing it with sunny, outdoorsy content, day-in-the-life clips, and sometimes faith-based reflections.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Girly Swirly Bible Study (@girlyswirlybiblestudy)

4. Bottom Of Your Boots

Ella Langley's new song is very much a “say it with your whole chest” kind of track. After being teased live and on This Past Weekend podcast, creators are leaning into it with lip syncs and soft country aesthetics.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Danielle Haugan | HAIR HELPER & BUSINESS BESTIE ✨ (@officiald)

5. Original audio by chrisbrownofficial

How could a tour announcement from Chris Brown and Usher not become a major trending sound moment? The original trailer audio — packed with revving engines and that cinematic “we’re pulling up” energy — is being reused by fans, news accounts, and promos. If your content has a main event moment, try this sound to do the heavy lifting for you.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by BROWN (@chrisbrownofficial)

6. A Good Day Humming

This track by Mimi Chill Music features soft humming and light acoustic tones. It’s gentle, cozy, and uplifting — quintessentially Instagram. It's perfect for morning coffee routines, tidy homes, pets curled up in sun patches, aesthetic brand content, and those intentional, slow-living moments.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Tahlia | Our version of the good life. (@freemansroad)

7. Titanium x Please Me (Slowed)

This song by TRUE CHAD is fueling a fun “stress-o-meter” trend. Creators use the mash-up to contrast two scenarios: a high-cortisol moment followed by the low-cortisol antidote (generally leaning towards a tongue-in-cheek reveal).

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Nevin Nardo (@_nevinnardo_)

8. Planet Rock

Following the passing of Afrika Bambaataa in April, his hit Planet Rock is seeing a resurgence on Instagram. The 1982 track — a cornerstone of early hip-hop and electronic music — is being used by fans and creators to honor his legacy, with clips that celebrate the culture he helped shape.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by + 𝚗𝚊𝚖𝚞𝚑𝚞𝚎𝚖𝚊𝚗.𝚌𝚘𝚖 (nh+) (@namuhueman)

9. april

april by ILOVEFLOWERS is making an appropriately on-the-nose appearance across Instagram right now. It’s a soft piano track that feels like spring in audio form — light, delicate, and easy to layer under just about anything. I’ve been seeing it paired with travel, crafting, art, baking, and anything that lends itself to a pretty aesthetic.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Yasmin | Tastemaker, Luxury London & Travel destinations (@yasgoesto)

10. Original audio by emmyyberry

This original audio from Emmy (a former ballerina turned powerlifter) is quickly becoming a go-to for gym content. It layers Brain Stew by Green Day with a punchy “girl, girl” voiceover pulled from the series Heated Rivalry. I’ve been seeing creators use it to share lifting PRs, progress clips, and those “don’t underestimate me” moments.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by TRIBE 99 ® (@tribe99official)

11. Runway

If there’s ever been a sound designed for a dramatic entrance (or exit), this is it. Runway by Lady Gaga and Doechii is the lead single from The Devil Wears Prada 2 soundtrack, it leans all the way into bold struts. "No matter what, no matter what. You got to strut. Walk, I'm feeling fab. I'm feeling free, I feel exceptionally me."

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by Barry Brandon (@thequeerindigo)

12. COCONUT

COCONUT (feat. Eem Triplin) by SAILORR and Eem Triplin is firmly in its dance challenge era on Instagram right now. I’ve been seeing a mix of polished group routines and more casual “learn it with me” takes.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by 쌍둥이 (@ohoh0o5o)

13. Original audio by browsbyzulema

This original audio from browsbyzulema is one of those simple ideas that just works: you see the finished look, hear "world, stop," then see the process behind the polish. I’ve been seeing it used especially in makeup tutorials and before-and-after transformations, where that pause moment builds just enough anticipation before the final reveal. Low effort to try, high payoff in scroll-stopping power.

🎧 Get the audio

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A post shared by TUFAN GUEVEN (@tufanmakeup)

How to find trending audio on Instagram

Not loving any of the above options? No sweat: here’s a crash course on how to find trending sounds on Instagram Reels.

1. Use Instagram’s trending audio list: Check Instagram’s built-in leaderboard for the top 50 trending songs updated every few days. Find it when creating a post, story, or reel on the Instagram mobile app by tapping the music icon, then selecting ‘Trending.’ Save tracks for later with the bookmark icon.
2. Check the professional dashboard: If you have a professional account in the US, visit the Professional Dashboard on your profile, scroll to Tips and resources, and tap Trending audio for curated suggestions on Instagram Reels.
3. Look for the arrow icon: As you scroll reels, watch for an upward arrow next to audio tracks—that’s Instagram’s indicator that a sound is trending.
4. Follow Instagram’s Creators account: The @creators account shares regular updates on trending songs, editing tips for Instagram Reels, and feature announcements. Check out their IG Anthems highlight for more trending songs and trending sounds.
5. Check TikTok or YouTube Shorts for early trends: Many trending Instagram Reels sounds originate on TikTok or YouTube Shorts. Browse trending sounds there, then search for those tracks on Instagram to get ahead of the curve.

Don't forget about original audio

As you can see from some of the audio we've mentioned on the list, many creators are making waves with their own clips, and jumping on a trending original track can give your content an extra boost and help it stand out in feeds.

💡Pro tip: You can find trending original audio on your professional dashboard under the Original audio tab.

Happy posting with these trending Instagram songs!

You're well-equipped to find the next great trending audio on Instagram for your reels, carousels, or single-photo posts — and you've got several great tracks to put in your back pocket if you get stuck!

If you’ve created an Instagram Reel with one of these trending songs, we’d love to see it. Tag @buffer on Instagram so we can find you!

I don’t know about you, but my earworms are pretty much exclusively trending songs from TikTok at this point. (Even the non-music sounds from TikTok tend to get stuck in my head, but I digress…)

The catchiness of these tunes is incredibly powerful for creators and brands on the social media platform to tap into, because not only do users remember the song — chances are, videos that featured the track will probably stick in their minds, too.

Beyond memorability, of course, is the algorithmic effect of being right on the cusp of a trending TikTok song. And who would say no to a little boost for the content they worked so hard on?

In this post, I’ll share the most viral songs and sounds on TikTok in April 2026 — and how to use them to boost your content.

Why trending TikTok sounds matter

Since you’re here, I probably don’t need to tell you that using a hot sound on TikTok can increase your chances of landing on the For You Page, especially if you’re early to the trend.

TikTok’s algorithm often prioritizes familiarity and repeatability, so when a song is on the rise, jumping on it can give your post more visibility.

For example, if I’m scrolling through my FYP and watch a video with a particular audio, the TikTok algorithm will likely test the waters with another video that uses the same sound a couple of videos later. The algorithm wants to understand exactly why I lingered on the first video. Was it the music?

If yes — boy, does the FYP have more where that came from.

The right TikTok sounds or songs can instantly set the tone, spark emotion, or cue a punchline for your audience — particularly if the sound, like many of the ones below, has been used in a specific way.

The songs or audio that rise to that level of virality that they become a moment in time for internet culture are the really special ones.

All that said: you don't need to spend hours scrolling to find the right audio for your next post. Here are the most popular TikTok songs and audio right now, updated in April 2026. We’ll keep this list regularly updated, so do be sure to bookmark this page and come back if you need more inspiration!

How to find trending songs on TikTok

• Browse TikTok’s Creative Center: Visit the Creative Center to see top trending songs by region and time period (above) — it’s TikTok’s built-in trend tracker for sounds, creators, and hashtags.
• Use TikTok’s search bar: Search phrases like “viral sound” in the TikTok app, tap the Sounds tab, and scroll through the most-used tracks labeled popular.
• Get personalized recommendations from TikTok: When you upload a video, TikTok will suggest music that matches your content — a great shortcut for finding relevant sounds.
• Discover playlists curated by TikTok: Tap Add Music > Discover more sounds to browse playlists by genre, category, or what’s hot in your region.
• Check out Tokchart: Tokchart shows the fastest-rising TikTok sounds from the past 24 hours, updated in real time. You'll need a paid account to get all the details.
• Look for trending audio on Instagram: Instagram Reels often feature songs that cross over to TikTok. Tap the music icon in the Reels editor and check the Trending tab for current hits.

💡 Bonus tip: Always preview how a sound is being used. Tap the sound name on TikTok to watch example videos — this gives you the context you need to ride (or remix) the trend.

13 trending TikTok songs and sounds

Updated April 2026

1. Classic classical gymnopedie solo piano(1034554)

This gentle piano track is having a moment again. The soft, minimalist sound is popping up everywhere, from emotional moments to aesthetic morning routines and even humor (yes, even the “exhale and try to scream” challenge — the contrast is the whole joke).

✔️ Approved for business use.

🎧 Get the song

2. Gucci

Gucci by MAF Teeski is one of those sounds that shouldn’t work for wholesome nostalgia… and yet here we are. It’s the backbone of the “I wanna be a mommy / baby when I grow up” trend, where creators pair childhood photos with present-day clips (usually a partner getting a “hey mommy” or “hey baby” text) in a quick bait-and-switch.

⚠️ Warning: Contains expletives.

🎧 Get the song

3. Snowfall (Slowed)

Snowfall (Slowed) by dunsky is one of those blink-and-you-miss-it audios. It’s super ambient, almost ghostlike, which is exactly why creators love it. I’ve been seeing it used as a barely-there backdrop for voiceovers and “real talk” moments, where the audio adds just enough mood without competing for attention.

✔️ Approved for business use.

🎧 Get the sound

4. A Dream

A Dream by Flatsound is emotional — a little heavy — and I’ve been seeing it paired with reflective content, gentle photo dumps, nostalgia, and those late-night thought voiceovers that feel almost like a journal entry.

🎧 Get the song

5. voices

OK, ambient is officially in. This song by Øneheart is airy and introspective. I’ve been seeing it used for “what could have been” moments, travel recaps, and emotional montages.

Fun fact: Øneheart also co-created snowfall, which has racked up over 900 million Spotify streams — and helped cement this whole ambient wave we’re seeing across TikTok.

✔️ Approved for business use.

🎧 Get the song

6. Monkeyshine NO PERC-JP

Monkeyshine by Lt FitzGibbons Men is basically TikTok’s unofficial “uh-oh” soundtrack right now. The second it starts, you just know something ridiculous is about to happen. If you’re about to do something silly (or document someone else doing it), this is your cue — press record, hit this sound, and let the chaos unfold.

🎧 Get the song

7. Kitchen Flowers

Bring out the tissues. Kitchen Flowers is one of those tracks that sneaks up on you. It’s soft and deeply intimate — the kind of sound that pairs perfectly with breakup reflections, grief processing, or those “I didn’t realize how much this meant to me” moments.

🎧 Get the song

8. realization

TikTok is keeping it deep with realization by Futureville. The song carries an intensity that makes everything feel a bit more profound. I’ve been seeing it used for deep, reflective content like relationship realizations and faith-based messages. It also works beautifully for slower, aesthetic edits where the visuals do the talking.

🎧 Get the song

9. The Best of Both Worlds

The Best of Both Worlds from Hannah Montana is having a nostalgia revival. With the 20th anniversary special (and that reunion led by Miley Cyrus), TikTok has gone straight back to its 2000s roots. The sound is pure, wholesome pop — instantly recognizable, instantly mood-lifting — and creators are running with it.

🎧 Get the song

10. Birthday Girl

Birthday Girl by Hunxho is the perfect celebration track. I’ve been seeing it used super literally (in the best way): over-the-top cakes, outfit reveals, surprise parties, and those “it’s my day and I’m going big” moments. If there’s confetti involved (real or metaphorical), this sound fits.

🎧 Get the song

11. I'm Not Them

Them & I have another emotional hit that’s finding its way across TikTok right now. It’s guitar-led and heartfelt, and I’ve been seeing it paired with simple text overlays — deep thoughts, realizations, or things people wish they’d said. It doesn’t need much in the way of visuals to land.

🎧 Get the song

12. 500 miles

The 1960s hit 500 Miles by Peter, Paul & Mary is having an emotional comeback on TikTok — and it’s all about that one line: “Lord, I’m 500 miles from my home.” Creators are taking it very literally, pairing the lyric with carousel posts that show just how far they are from where they feel most at home.

🎧 Get the song

13. The End

Appropriately, the last song on this month's list is The End by LLow. The song is pure drama. It opens with this intense, choral build before dropping into a beat. If you’ve got a moment that feels like the end of the world (but… isn’t), this sound turns it into a cinematic punchline.

✔️ Approved for business use.

🎧 Get the song

⚡Pro tip: For business use on TikTok, only use songs from TikTok’s Commercial Music Library or tracks you have a royalty-free/commercial license for. Using personal-use music in ads or branded content can get your videos muted or removed, so always double-check the license before posting.

Found a track for your next TikTok?

When you're creating content for your business or personal brand, staying on top of TikTok's audio trends can help you reach new audiences and keep your content fresh.

Start with one or two of the methods we discussed to find popular sounds — and don't forget to save your favorites for later.

If you've created a TikTok post with audio from this list, we'd love to see it. Tag @bufferapp on TikTok so we can find you!

Facebook wasn't really on my radar as a place to make money. Instagram, sure. TikTok, absolutely. But Facebook felt like the platform I used to keep up with my high school friends, rather than the one I'd turn to for creator income.

But things are changing! Facebook has been making a lot of effort to lure over creators from other platforms — especially when it comes to monetization.

As a nano creator, I’ve been keeping a close eye on this for several months now. Brand partnerships make up a small part of my income, but most platforms’ native monetization features are woefully out of reach for me as a small creator.

So Facebook piqued my interest. The idea that I could earn money from content I'm already making was enough to send me down a research rabbit hole.

This article is what I came back with. Down the rabbit hole we go!

Can you actually make money on Facebook?

Short answer: yes, and increasingly so.

Facebook paid creators nearly $3 billion in 2025 through its monetization programs — a 35% increase from the year before, and the platform's highest annual payout ever. The number of creators earning more than $10,000 a year on Facebook grew by over 30% year-over-year, too.

What's changed recently is that Facebook no longer limits payouts to video creators. Through its Content Monetization program, creators now earn from reels, stories, photos, and text posts. In 2025, about 60% of total payouts went to reels, with the remaining 40% split across other formats. So even if you're not making videos, there's still a path to earning.

Whether you're a creator exploring a new platform, a small business owner looking for an additional revenue stream, or someone (like me) who's curious about making money as a nano creator, Facebook has more options than most people realize.

How Facebook monetization works

There are four different routes to native monetization on Facebook (that is, earning money from Facebook itself). The most straightforward is Facebook Content Monetization, but creators can also earn by joining the Creator Fast Track Program, earning Stars, or setting up subscriptions.

Let’s start with the main one, Facebook Content Monetization. It’s an invite-only program that pays creators based on how their content performs. It used to be limited to in-stream ads on longer videos, but it's expanded a lot in recent months to include reels, photos, text posts, and even stories.

It works a bit like YouTube monetization — you post eligible content, and Facebook places ads in and around that content. You earn a share of the ad revenue based on performance.

Then there’s the Creator Fast Track program, which seems to be a bit of a sub-program for eligible folks. No performance-based earnings here — creators get paid just to post. Still, it’s a bit trickier to get into than general monetization.

Stars are completely different — and ‘gifted’ to creators by fans. They’re a bit like tips. For every star earned, Meta pays out $0.01 USD.

Then, subscriptions are a bit like having an exclusive Patreon for your Facebook superfans.

Subscriptions are the only one of these native monetization options that are exclusive to Facebook pages. The rest are available to Facebook professional mode profiles as well.

In all cases, creators can check (and withdraw!) their earnings in their dashboard or in the Meta Business Suite (pages only), along with metrics to help them understand which posts made bank, and which didn’t.

These aren’t the only ways to earn, however — more on that in a sec.

Facebook monetization requirements

Before you can earn from Facebook's official programs, you'll need to meet a couple of requirements. These vary depending on the monetization tool you're going after.

Here’s a big-picture look at them all, but I’ll give the comprehensive list in the section below.

In all cases, you’ll need to have either a professional personal profile or a Facebook Page and be in good standing with Partner Monetization Policies and Community Standards.

Almost all these programs are available pretty widely globally, except Fast Track — that one’s only open to folks in the US and Canada (🥲).

• Stars (fan tipping) is the most accessible — you need 500 followers for 30 consecutive days and to be in an eligible country.
• Facebook Content Monetization program is invite-only and… less clear. Facebook says invites are ‘sent out periodically,’ but has not shared eligibility criteria.
• Fan subscriptions require at least 10K followers (or 250+ return viewers), plus 50K post engagements or 180K watch minutes in the last 60 days.
• The Creator Fast Track program is really for established creators on other platforms. You need at least 20K followers on Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok, and at least 30K video views in the last 60 days.

When you’re eligible, you’ll see an invite like the one below in Meta Business Suite (for pages) or in your creator dashboard (for professional profiles).

Yes, there are a couple of hoops to jump through (I’m right there with you!), but there are other ways to make money on Facebook we haven’t touched on yet.

Here’s a comprehensive list on all the ways to make money on Facebook as a creator.

7 ways to make money on Facebook

Here's a full round-up of all the ways creators and influencers and earn on Facebook.

1. Join the Content Monetization program

This is the big one — Facebook's flagship monetization program that pays creators for all types of content, not just video. If you can get invited, it's the most direct way to earn from content you're already posting.

The program works by placing ads around your content, and you earn a share of that ad revenue. What makes it really cool is the format flexibility. While reels are the highest earning format, photos, text posts, and stories all qualify.

Eligibility: Content Monetization is currently invite-only. The best way to improve your chances is to switch to a professional profile, use a page, or post consistently and build engagement. Facebook has been gradually expanding access, so it's worth checking your Professional Dashboard regularly.

2. Apply for Creator Fast Track

This is brand new — Meta launched Creator Fast Track in March 2026, and it's designed specifically for established creators who are new to (or returning to) Facebook. The pitch: guaranteed pay just for posting reels, plus increased reach to help you build a Facebook audience faster.

The program pays out monthly, with tiers based on your follower count on Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube:

• 20,000-99,999 followers: $100-$450/month
• 100,000-999,999 followers: $1,000/month
• 1,000,000+ followers: $3,000/month

To unlock your payout each month, you need to post 15 eligible reels on Facebook, uploaded across at least 10 separate days. There are no Facebook view counts to hit.

Bonus: You can crosspost content you've already made for other platforms. It just needs to be your original work and not already posted on Facebook. So you may not even have to make new content.

On top of the guaranteed pay, accepted creators get increased reach on eligible reels (very appealing as well) and immediate access to Content Monetization. That means you can earn even more from the performance of your content, and you stay in the Content Monetization program after Creator Fast Track ends.

Eligibility: To be eligible, you need to live in the US or Canada, be 18 or older, have (or create) a Facebook Page with an account that's at least 30 days old, and not have posted a Facebook reel in the past six months. You'll also need at least 20K followers and 30K video views in the last 60 days on Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube.

3. Collect Stars from fans

Stars are Facebook's tipping feature — viewers can buy Stars for $0.01 each and send them to creators during live streams, on reels and for other content. If you get 5,000 Stars, that's $50.

It might not mean loads of money, but it’s pretty accessible. You only need 500 followers for 30 consecutive days to be eligible, which puts it within reach for a lot of creators who aren't close to the thresholds for other programs yet. It's especially valuable for creators who do live content — Q&As, tutorials, behind-the-scenes streams — where audiences feel personally connected enough to tip.

To enable Stars, head to Creator Studio, select Creative Tools, then Live Dashboard, and toggle Stars on.

Eligibility: You need at least 500 followers for 30 consecutive days, and you need to be in an eligible country (though it’s pretty widely available!). Stars are available on both Facebook Pages and professional mode profiles, and there's no minimum view count or engagement threshold — which is why it's the most accessible of Facebook's native monetization options. You do need to be 18+ and have a payout account set up to actually receive earnings.

4. Set up fan subscriptions

Fan subscriptions let you put some content behind a paywall for a monthly fee that you set. Think of it as a mini-membership: subscribers might get exclusive behind-the-scenes content, early access to posts, subscriber-only Lives, or special badges.

The eligibility requirements are steeper — you'll need at least 10K followers and strong recent engagement. But if you've built a dedicated audience, the recurring nature of subscriptions makes your income a lot more predictable than ad revenue (which can swing wildly month to month).

A word of advice from creators who've done this well: make sure the subscription price reflects the value. Research what other creators in your niche charge. Too high and you'll alienate followers; too low and you're undervaluing your work.

Eligibility: You'll need at least 10K followers (or 250+ return viewers), plus 50K post engagements or 180K watch minutes in the last 60 days. Subscriptions are only available on Facebook Pages — not professional mode profiles. You also need to be 18+ and in an eligible country. Availability is broad; there are only a handful of countries that aren’t on the list. Check here for your specific country's status.

5. Partner with brands on sponsored content

If you take one thing away from this article, let it be this: You don’t need to have thousands of followers to earn from brand partnerships. As a creator with under 30K followers on all my platforms combined, I can personally attest to this! gets off soap box

You don't need to be in any official monetization program, either — you just need an audience that a brand wants to reach. This is how a lot of creators (including me, as a nano creator) earn the bulk of their income.

My best partnerships have come from one of two ways:

1. Personally reaching out to a brand I love and want to create content about
2. Tagging a brand in content I’ve already made about their product

There’s a third option, and that’s applying for a creator program or marketplace like Collabstr, Passionfroot, or Aspire.io — there are hundreds of marketplaces out there that help match brands with creators, and they’re worth exploring for sure.

Once you’ve landed a partnership (yay, you!) you should explicitly label it as such on Facebook. When creating a post, tap the handshake icon at the bottom of the composer, search for the brand's Page, and tag them. This adds a "Paid partnership with [Brand Name]" label to your post. There's also a toggle to let the brand boost the post as an ad, which many will want — it's worth discussing upfront.

Eligibility (for paid partnership label): Any creator with a professional mode profile or Facebook Page can use the paid partnership label. Creator Marketplace has its own thresholds (1,000+ followers and engagement minimums). For the brand deals themselves, there's no official follower minimum — it comes down to what brands are looking for.

6. Set up a Facebook Shop

If you have an established product line (physical or digital), a Facebook Shop lets people browse and buy without leaving the app. You can tag products directly in your posts, reels, and stories to make content shoppable.

This pairs well with the creator monetization tools — imagine earning ad revenue on a reel while also driving product sales from tagged items in that same reel. For small business owners, it turns Facebook from a marketing channel into a direct sales channel.

Eligibility: Facebook Shops are available in the US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, UK, and most of Western Europe (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, and others), plus Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. You'll need to comply with Meta's Commerce Policies, have an online store or product catalog, and demonstrate trustworthiness through an authentic, established presence on the platform.

7. Promote affiliate products

Affiliate marketing involves sharing products you use and earning a commission when someone buys through your link. Commission rates typically fall between 5% and 25%, depending on the program and product category.

The setup is simple: find affiliate programs in your niche (search "[your niche] + affiliate program" or check whether your favorite brands offer one), get approved, create your referral links, and share them in your Facebook posts and video descriptions. Just be transparent about affiliate relationships — your audience will appreciate the honesty, and it's required by law in many countries anyway.

You can also tap into Facebook Affiliate Partnerships, a native system that lets creators tag shoppable products directly inside posts and reels and earn commissions on qualifying stuff. It's currently available with Amazon (US), Shopee (Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Brazil, Taiwan), and Mercado Libre (Brazil, Mexico), with eBay and Temu in the US expected to follow.

Eligibility: There's no follower minimum for traditional affiliate marketing — anyone can share affiliate links in their posts. You can link existing affiliate accounts through Meta Business Suite and manage everything from your Professional Dashboard.

How to get paid on Facebook

Once you've earned money through any of Facebook's official programs, you'll need to set up your payout account.

Here's how it works:

Facebook processes payments monthly, usually between the 17th and the 22nd of each month for earnings from the prior month. There are two payout thresholds depending on the monetization tool: $25 for some features and $100 for others. Payment options vary by country but typically include bank transfer and PayPal.

To set up your payout information: go to your Professional Dashboard, navigate to Monetization settings, and follow the prompts to add your bank account or payment method. Make sure your tax information is up to date too — Facebook requires this before processing any payments.

A few more bits and bobs to help you earn and grow

Getting monetized is the first step — growing what you earn comes down to a couple of things I keep coming back to in my own research.

The biggest one is consistency across formats. Facebook rewards creators who show up regularly, and with Content Monetization paying for reels, photos, text posts, and stories, you're not boxed into video.

Our data on the best times to post on Facebook can help you figure out when to publish for maximum reach. And if you're already creating for other platforms, crossposting to Facebook is one of the easiest ways to expand your earnings without doubling your workload — tools like Buffer make that pretty painless (have you tried our duplicate feature? swoon).

The other thing worth mentioning: Facebook is actively prioritizing original content and cracking down on reposted and spammy stuff. Original content qualifies for higher monetization rates too, so there's a direct financial incentive to create for the platform rather than just reshare.

Understanding how the Facebook algorithm works helps here — the more your content gets distributed, the more qualified views you earn, and the more you get paid.

I'm still early in my own Facebook experiment, but the monetization options are more developed than I expected going in — and they're growing fast. If you're a creator who's been sleeping on Facebook (like I was), it might be worth a second look.

Facebook monetization FAQ

How many followers do you need to make money on Facebook?

It depends on which monetization tool you're using. Stars has the lowest bar at 500 followers for 30 consecutive days. Fan subscriptions need 10K (or 250 return viewers). The Content Monetization program's exact threshold isn't publicly listed, while the Creator Fast Track Program requires at least 20K on other platforms.

How many views do you need to start earning on Facebook?

For in-stream ads, you need at least 600K minutes viewed in the last 60 days. For the Content Monetization program, Facebook uses "qualified views" as the metric — not every view counts toward earnings. Only unique views that last around 5 seconds will count as qualified, for example.

Do Facebook Reels make money?

Yes — and they're the top earner. Reels accounted for about 60% of total creator payouts on Facebook in 2025. They're monetized through the Content Monetization program via ads that play before, during, or after your reel.

Can you make $500 a day on Facebook?

Technically possible, but not where most people start. Earning $500 daily would take some combination of very high view counts, strong CPMs, a successful product operation, or solid brand deals. Most creators start small and build — which isn't a bad thing. Consistent smaller earnings from content you're already making add up faster than you'd expect.

What's the minimum payout on Facebook?

Either $25 or $100, depending on the monetization feature. Payments go out monthly, usually between the 17th and 22nd.

Should I switch to a professional profile on Facebook?

If you’re looking to earn money, you’ll need create a Facebook Page, or convert your personal Facebook profile into a professional profile. If you already have followers there, I’d go this route. It unlocks monetization tools, audience insights, and the Professional Dashboard.

How do I switch to a professional profile on Facebook?

Open the Facebook app, go to your profile, tap the three dots (⋯) menu, and look for Turn on professional mode. It takes about 30 seconds, and you can switch back to a personal profile at any time. Once it's on, you'll see a new "Professional Dashboard" option in your menu — that's where you'll manage monetization, check eligibility, and track your content's performance.

One thing to know: turning on professional mode makes your profile public by default. Your existing posts stay with their original privacy settings, but new posts will default to public. If you'd rather keep a separate presence for your creator content, setting up a Facebook Page is the other option — and the only one that supports fan subscriptions.

How do I check if I'm eligible for Facebook monetization?

Open your Professional Dashboard on Facebook, go to the Monetization tab, then Content Monetization on Meta Business Suite (for pages), navigate to All Tools > Monetization. If you're not eligible yet, you’ll be able to turn on a notification for if (when!) you get invited.

More creator resources

• The best time to post on Facebook
• How the Facebook algorithm works
• How to get more followers on Facebook
• Facebook Reels: what you need to know
• How to start and grow a Facebook Group
• Facebook benchmarks for engagement
• How to make money on Instagram
• How to make money on TikTok
• How to make money on YouTube

I've wanted to be a social media creator for years. Six months ago, I finally started — and almost quit before I posted a single thing. I had plenty of ideas — the problem was that every piece of advice I found was written for a brain that works very differently from mine.

I was diagnosed with ADHD in 2019 and level one autism in 2020 — and not one article I read addressed what it takes to stay consistent when your brain fights you on it. So I stopped following everyone else's advice and built a system that works for my brain instead.

My brain doesn't naturally see the steps between "start a social media account" and "become a successful creator." I see the end goal, but not the path. Standard advice like "be consistent," "show up every day” assumes you can translate those phrases into daily action. But I couldn't. I needed every step broken into smaller steps.

Here's the system I built, and use every day to stay consistent. It was designed for my neurodivergent brain, but if you've ever felt paralyzed by a blank content calendar, it'll probably work for yours too.

Lower your starting bar

Most beginner advice tells you to "stay consistent" — so I took that literally and decided posting every single day across every platform was the only way to do it right.

As you can imagine, that didn’t last long, and I ended up burnt out before I was able to really get started.

So I made two decisions: I picked one platform — TikTok — and committed to one video post per week. That was it.  I didn't add a second platform until the first one felt easy, and I didn't increase my posting frequency until the current one felt boring.

Once I had a good system, I moved to LinkedIn and began posting once per week, twice per week, all the way up to seven days a week. 

The other thing that unlocked consistency for me was letting go of "perfect." I'm a raging perfectionist with ADHD, which is a brutal combination. I didn't just want my content to be good — I needed it to be perfect before anyone could see it. And when I couldn't get it there, I'd scrap it and start over, or just not post at all. Lowering the bar on both platform and perfection helped me more with consistency than anything else I'd tried.

My main advice here is don't compare your beginning to someone else's middle. Don't add a second platform until the first one feels easy. That way, you won’t spread yourself too thin before finding your footing.

Capture ideas immediately

Having ADHD means your brain is always running, even when you desperately want it to stop. For me, it feels like standing at a railroad crossing while a train barrels through. Each car is a different thought, a different idea, a different thing I should be doing, and once they're gone, they're gone forever

I knew I had to find a way to capture ideas in the moment, since most of them came at the worst possible times — in the shower, while driving, or right before falling asleep.

 I started with the Notes app on my iPhone, jotting down quick ideas I'd later move to a Google Doc when I was at my computer. Then I discovered voice memos. Being able to just talk through an idea was a game-changer for a brain that moves as fast as mine. Now I use Otter.ai to capture and transcribe voice notes, which means nothing gets lost in translation either.

Having a system for capturing ideas was only half the battle. The other half was actually doing something with them. During my content creation time, I go through my ideas and develop them into solid concepts and sometimes even full scripts, depending on the platform.

Start “batching” your content

When I first started creating content, I thought I was supposed to record and write something every single day. The constant context switching was a lot on my brain. I need to "get in the zone" when it comes to creating, and my life has plenty of distractions that make doing that every single day impossible.

I saw Kirsti’s content creation article, and I really liked her “batch content creation” tip, so I started implementing that into my content creation routine. I started dedicating one morning per week to content creation, where I would create five to six pieces of content in one sitting. Now that I have a routine around batching, I’ve added a second morning, but only creating three to four pieces of content in a sitting. The rest of the week, I schedule my posts and engage with my community.

This works for me because it means I only need to show up twice instead of all seven days, and it has been a lifesaver for my sanity.

Create a simple content calendar with themed days

In addition to ADHD, I have autism, and the two do not always agree. My autistic brain wants a plan. My ADHD brain wants to throw the plan out the window. 

The solution I landed on was a flexible framework instead of a rigid schedule. For content creation, that framework is a simple content calendar in Google Sheets with themed days instead of a full content plan. 

My TikTok calendar looks something like this: carousel days, gaming tips and tricks, cat video day, CapCut memes. The themes repeat every week, which means I never have to decide what kind of content to make, only what I'll create within that format on that day. 

Build templates

Starting from scratch was another thing that overwhelmed me early on. Having to create videos, memes, and carousels with no starting point made the whole thing feel bigger than it needed to be. Templates killed that paralysis.

I started with one template in CapCut for my gaming videos, and one for LinkedIn built around a framework I keep coming back to: Hook, Story, Lesson, CTA. Every LinkedIn post I write starts there. The hook grabs attention, the story makes it personal, the lesson makes it useful, and the CTA gives the reader somewhere to go. I fill in the framework instead of starting from scratch.

Start with one template for your most common content type, then build others as you start to identify what you're drawn to creating.

Automate, automate, automate!

Having ADHD means I'm so forgetful that sometimes I wonder how I function throughout the day. If you've ever walked into a room and immediately forgotten why, imagine that happening on repeat, all day long. When it came to content creation, I'd create something I was genuinely proud of and forget to post it for days. Sometimes weeks.

The fix was simple: I stopped relying on myself to remember. Now I use Buffer to schedule my content on LinkedIn and TikTok. I schedule everything right after my batch creation sessions, while I'm already in content mode. That way, posting happens whether my brain shows up for it or not.

For when you fall off track

Part of being neurodivergent is that you will miss posts sometimes. I've missed weeks, abandoned calendars, and ghosted my own accounts. The difference now is that I have a system to come back to, so when it happens, I know exactly how to find my way back.

When I miss a week, I don't try to catch up or post twice as much the next week. I just pick up where I left off. One post, one platform, one day. Your system should be forgiving enough to survive your worst brain days.

If this system feels like a lot, start where I did. Pick one platform, post once a week, and don't worry about the rest until that feels easy. You don't have to build the whole thing at once, you just have to start.

Facebook is a new frontier for me. I've been having loads of fun over the past few months experimenting with the shiny new features Facebook has launched to woo creators.

Facebook itself may not be all that shiny, but there’s no denying that it's enormous. And for a lot of creators, small business owners, and marketers, it's a great place to find new audiences.

I'll be honest, though: even Facebook has over three billion monthly active users, and I'm... not reaching even a teeny tiny fraction of them. My content performance has been hit and miss.

So when Buffer's senior data scientist, Julian Winternheimer, dug into over a million Facebook posts as part of his cross-platform comment engagement study, I was really curious to see what he'd find.

Could being super on top of replying to comments help me boost my reach?

Short answer: Yes! Long answer: Yes, potentially... Let’s unpack that.

Posts where creators replied to comments received about 9.5% more reactions than posts where they didn't. That might not sound like a jaw-dropping number — especially compared to the 42% lift Julian found on Threads or the 30% on LinkedIn — but on a platform as mature and broad as Facebook, a consistent single-digit lift across a million posts is nothing to wave away.

What I find most interesting about this data is what it reveals beneath the surface. The raw numbers actually suggest the opposite at first glance — and it took some smart statistical analysis to uncover what's really going on.

How we analyzed the data

Let’s get nerdy. Julian pulled around one million Facebook posts that received at least one comment, spanning accounts of all sizes and niches.

Rather than comparing big Facebook Pages to small ones (which would tell us very little), he compared each account to its own performance over time. The method — called a fixed-effects regression model — holds constant all the things that make each account different: audience size, niche, location, posting frequency. All of that gets baked into the baseline.

So instead of asking "Do Facebook Pages that reply get more engagement than pages that don't?" we're asking: "Does this specific Facebook Page perform better when it replies versus when it doesn't?"

He also ran a Z-score analysis as a second check — measuring how far above or below "normal" each post performed for that specific account. Both methods pointed in the same direction, which gives us a lot more confidence in the finding.

(If you're interested in the full methodology — and want more charts — you can check Julian's full analysis on his blog.)

A few things worth keeping in mind before we get into the numbers: we can't say with absolute certainty that replying causes higher reactions. It's possible that posts that naturally perform well attract more activity, and creators are simply more motivated to reply when there's a buzzing comment section.

Julian's dataset also measures reactions specifically (likes, loves, hahas, etc.) rather than total engagement — a deliberate choice to avoid the circularity of including comments in an engagement metric that's testing the effect of comments.

That said, the pattern shows up across all six platforms Julian analyzed, with lifts ranging from 5% to 42%. That kind of cross-analysis consistency is something data scientists love to see. It makes the findings that much more convincing.

How replying to comments impacts Facebook engagement

Julian’s fixed-effects model — covering over 1 million posts across 97,427 Facebook profiles — found that posts with replied-to comments receive approximately 9.5% more reactions on average.

The effect is statistically significant (p < 0.001, for the stats-inclined among us).

The Z-score analysis backed this up. About 53.8% of Facebook Pages performed better when they replied. In other words, posts with replied-to comments sat slightly above each account's usual performance level, while posts without replied comments hovered right at baseline.

That "53.8%" number is worth pausing on. It's a slimmer majority than what Julian found on Instagram (63%) or LinkedIn (83%). Facebook's effect is statistically significant, but it's more modest — which tracks with the platform's broader, more mature engagement patterns.

Some fun behind-the-scenes stuff: If we just looked at the raw median numbers, posts without replied-to comments actually have slightly higher median reactions (22) than those with replies (16). On the surface, that seems to contradict everything I just said.

But that comparison is misleading — it's mixing together Facebook Pages of wildly different sizes and activity levels. Once Julian controlled for those differences and compared each account to itself, things looked very different (and gave us the numbers I shared above).

Why this matters for Facebook

Facebook is a different beast compared to newer, more conversation-forward platforms like Threads or LinkedIn.

The Facebook algorithm prioritizes what it calls "meaningful interactions" — and comments, particularly back-and-forth exchanges, are one of the strongest signals of that. When you reply to a comment, you're creating a conversation thread that signals to the algorithm that your post is sparking real discussion, not just passive scrolling.

There are a few reasons why this likely translates into higher reactions:

Extended visibility. Comment threads keep posts active in the feed longer. Every reply is another signal fire to the algorithm that might resurface the post for the commenter's connections — and for anyone else who's previously interacted with your page.

Relationship signals. Facebook tracks interaction history between accounts. When you consistently reply to someone's comments, the platform registers that connection and is more likely to show your future posts to them. Over time, these micro-interactions compound.

Social proof. An active comment section with replies from the creator or brand signals that there's a real person behind the Page. People are more likely to stop scrolling and react when they see that the creator is actually present in the conversation.

The 9.5% lift might feel modest next to Threads' 42%, but context matters. Facebook's sheer scale means that even a small percentage increase in reactions can translate to meaningfully more people seeing and engaging with your content. And unlike some platform-specific tactics, replying to comments is something you can start doing right now with zero additional tools, budget, or strategy overhaul.

How to stay on top of your Facebook comments

If you're managing a Facebook Page alongside other platforms (who isn’t?), keeping up with comments can feel like another full-time job.

Here are a few approaches that have helped me keep on top of my comments across Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads, YouTube, TikTok, and Facebook:

Time block your replies

Rather than trying to respond to every single comment (which can quickly become unsustainable as you grow), dedicate two 10-to-15-minute windows each day for comment engagement. Mid-morning and early evening tend to work well — you'll catch comments from both the morning scrollers and the after-work crowd.

Prioritize conversations

A "thanks!" reply is fine, but it's not what drives the engagement flywheel. Try asking a follow-up question or adding a detail that keeps the thread going. "Great question — have you tried..." or "That's a good point, we actually found that..." are the kinds of replies that tend to generate more activity.

Reply while the post is fresh (if you can)

Like most platforms, Facebook's algorithm gives early engagement heavy weight. If you can get into the comments within the first couple of hours after posting, you're more likely to spark additional reactions while the post is still being distributed. (This is where posting at times when you're actually available to engage becomes a real strategic advantage.)

Use a tool that keeps everything in one place

If you're active on Facebook and a couple of other platforms, bouncing between apps to manage comments gets old fast. Buffer's Community tab pulls all your comments across platforms into a single dashboard — and you can reply directly from there without opening Facebook and getting pulled into the feed. It's free for up to three social accounts.

There's also a Comment Score feature that tracks your reply consistency over time — think of it like a streak tracker for engagement. It helps turn commenting from something you remember to do sporadically into an actual habit.

Putting the 'social' back in social media

Julian's cross-platform analysis covered millions of posts, and Facebook's 9.5% reaction lift sits at the lower end of the spectrum. But "lower end" doesn't mean it’s not helpful — it’s fitting for a platform where engagement patterns are broader and more varied than on conversation-first networks like Threads.

What I keep coming back to with this data — across Facebook and every other platform Julian analyzed — is how refreshingly simple the takeaway is. You don't need to crack some secret code or find a loophole in the algorithm. You're just showing up for the people who showed up for you.

The 9.5% lift isn't guaranteed for every Facebook Page (remember, around 54% of profiles in Julian's study saw positive effects), but the odds tilt in your favor if you're willing to put in the time. And on a platform with Facebook's reach, even a modest, consistent boost in reactions can make a real difference over time.

For the full breakdown of Julian's findings across all six platforms, check out our cross-platform engagement study.

More Facebook resources

• How the Facebook Algorithm Works
• How to Get More Followers on Facebook
• How to Increase Facebook Page Engagement
• Best Time to Post on Facebook
• Facebook Marketing for Small Business

When I first started posting on LinkedIn consistently, I couldn’t understand why some posts were a huge hit, while others flopped. That is, until I started monitoring my social media analytics.

Suddenly, it all became much clearer: I had data that pointed to which hooks grabbed the most attention, what posting times got the most engagement, plus the ideal length for a post. Everything clicked.

The clues are out there for you too, right in your analytics. But if you're running multiple platforms, manually piecing together insights from each one's native dashboard is a real time sink — and native analytics have some frustrating blind spots too (LinkedIn, for instance, doesn't show timestamps on past posts, which makes it really tricky to figure out your best posting times).

That's where third-party social media analytics tools come in. I've tested 11 of them for this list and organized everything by use case, so you can skip straight to what fits your needs. Creator, marketer, small business, enterprise — there's something here for everyone.

Key takeaways

• Analytics tools vs. management tools: Dedicated analytics tools focus purely on measurement. Social media management tools (like Buffer) bundle analytics with scheduling, engagement, and more. For most creators and small teams, the all-in-one option is often the best choice.
• Native platform analytics have real gaps: Most social media networks offer built-in insights, but they don't always show what you need — and if you're running multiple platforms, you'll spend a lot of time manually piecing data together. Third-party tools solve both problems.
• Prices range from free to $239+/month: Buffer, Social Status, and Tailwind offer free tiers. Rival IQ starts at $239/month. Most mid-market tools fall in the $49–$100/month range — creators and small teams rarely need the enterprise-tier options.

What are social media analytics?

First, a quick definition: social media analytics are the numbers that show how your posts have been performing across different platforms. Social media analytics can help you answer questions beyond "How many likes did this post get?" For example:

• Which are my best content types?
• When is my audience the most engaged?
• What kind of content gets followers talking?
• What kind of content is best for reaching new followers?

Social media analytics help you measure your performance and benchmark it against your social media goals.

Do all social media platforms offer native analytics?

Yes, they do. All major social media networks provide native insights within their platform. But there are a few issues when you rely solely on them:

Social media networks don't always provide the insights you need. For instance, LinkedIn doesn't show timestamps on past posts, making it tricky to understand what days and times are best to reach your audience.

Relying on native insights alone won't give you the full picture. Let's say you're running a large-scale social media campaign and using multiple social media networks. You'll have to manually cobble insights from all of them if you rely only on each channel's native insights. In contrast, on many social media analytics tools, you can gather all posts under one tab and monitor collective insights on how your campaign performed across channels.

Social media analytics software collects and helps you make sense of your performance data — so you can spend less time tracking and more time improving your social media strategy.

Analytics vs. reporting: what's the difference?

These terms get used interchangeably, but they're actually two parts of the same process. Analytics is the act of collecting and measuring data — it answers the "what happened?" and "why did it happen?" questions. Reporting takes that analysis and presents it in a clear, shareable format for stakeholders, clients, or your own team.

In practice, the best social media reporting tools handle both. They pull your raw data (analytics) and organize it into dashboards, PDFs, or branded presentations (reporting). Some tools lean more heavily into one or the other — Buffer, for instance, does both, while DashThis on this list is built primarily for reporting. Knowing which you need matters: if you're a solo creator, you probably just want the analytics dashboard. If you're an agency managing client accounts, automated reporting you can white-label is a game-changer.

The 4 types of social media analytics

Understanding the different types of analytics helps you know what to look for in a tool:

1. Descriptive analytics — What happened? Raw metrics like impressions, clicks, and engagement counts. Every analytics tool starts here.
2. Diagnostic analytics — Why did it happen? Why did this post outperform that one? Tools that dig into content type, posting time, and audience behavior sit here.
3. Predictive analytics — What will happen? Based on past performance, which content types will your audience engage with next? More advanced tools offer this.
4. Prescriptive analytics — What should you do? Not just predicting what will happen, but recommending the exact action to take. Some advanced tools venture here.

Most social media analytics tools focus on descriptive and diagnostic analytics, which will be exactly what most creators and marketers need. Premium tools like Socialinsider and Talkwalker push into predictive territory, but come at a (you guessed it) premium cost.

Social media analytics tools vs. management tools

There are dedicated social media analytics tools that only show insights from social media posts. And then there is social media management software that encompasses social media analytics along with scheduling posts, engaging with your audience, storing ideas, etc. This list contains options for both. But which one should you choose?

Choose social media management software if you're a creator, a one-person team, or a small marketing team managing your entire social media strategy.

Choose a dedicated social media analytics tool if you've already covered other aspects of your social media strategy (either manually or with another tool) and/or if you need specific insights about your social media efforts that a management tool can't provide.

In most cases, social media managers and creators will likely prefer one-stop social media management tools. Having everything in one place just makes life easier.

That said, there are times when standalone social media analytics tools might make more sense:

• When you need very specific insights — like competitive analysis — standalone tools often work better. Many social management tools offer competitor analysis, but a standalone tool often digs deeper and can provide more useful insights.
• When you're on a shoestring budget and managing your content calendar and social media engagement manually. Maybe you can't afford comprehensive social management software for multiple social media channels. But you might be able to swing a social media analytics tool that's a bit more budget-friendly.

What makes the best social media analytics tool?

After testing these 11 tools, here's what I looked for — and what I'd suggest you weigh when picking one:

• Platform coverage: Does it support the social networks you actually use? Some tools cover 12+ platforms; others only handle 3–4. Check before you commit.
• Ease of use: Can you find the metrics you need without a tutorial? The best tools surface key insights immediately — not behind five clicks and a custom report builder.
• Reporting capabilities: If you need to share results with a team, client, or stakeholder, look for tools with automated, customizable reports. Manual copy-pasting from dashboards is a time sink.
• Competitor benchmarking: Can you see how your metrics stack up against competitors, or are you flying blind? A nice-to-have, but something most free tools don't offer.
• Pricing transparency: Some tools don't publish pricing. I've noted this where applicable — it's worth factoring into your decision if you don't have the time for lengthy sales calls and negotiations.
• Integrations: Does it play nicely with your existing stack? Tools that connect to Google Analytics, your CRM, or your project management software save you time.

Quick summary of the 11 best social media analytics tools

1. Buffer

Best social media analytics tool for creators and small teams

I practically live in Buffer, and the analytics dashboard is one of my favorite tabs — it immediately shows you the metrics that actually matter.

Your best type of post, best day to post, best content format — it's all right there without digging through menus.

Instead of just throwing numbers at you, Buffer helps you make sense of the data, which is crucial for strapped-for-time creators and social media managers. And of course, if you need it, you can also see all the raw data and graphs showing you:

• Follower growth
• Total impressions
• Total engagement
• Hashtag performance
• Audience demographics
• Engagement rate and reach on specific posts

You can create beautiful branded reports in just a few clicks — no more manual copy-pasting.

Pricing: Free plan for up to three social media platforms (10 posts per channel). Advanced analytics tools are available on paid plans, which start at $6 per month.

Supported social media platforms: Bluesky, Facebook, Google Business, Instagram, LinkedIn, Mastodon, Pinterest, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube,

Note: The advanced analytics features are available in paid plans. The free plan includes basic analytics to help you get started.

2. Rival IQ

Best social media analytics tool for large agencies

Rival IQ stands out for its in-depth competitive benchmarking, making it the go-to choice for large social media agencies. It offers deep social media analytics and other related tools — like competitor analysis and social listening — built right into its analytics platform. Instead of paying for three separate tools, you can go with one.

Their pricing is designed for social media agencies:

• You can add at least 10 companies (your clients) to your account
• If you want to add more, you can add five companies for $50 per month
• You can swap the companies whose performance you're tracking

Compared to other social media analytics tools, I was impressed with its competitive benchmarking. Rival IQ shows when your competitor's posts are likely boosted, compares brand positioning (such as social media bios and other profile attributes), and benchmarks your performance within your social media niche and your chosen competitors.

As an agency, competitive analysis plays an important part in informing the social media strategy and social media reporting of your clients. Rival IQ makes that a breeze.

Pricing: Plans start at $239 per month. Free 14-day trial available.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, YouTube

3. Keyhole

Best social media analytics tool for market research

Keyhole excels at historical insights paired with market research — particularly if you need to understand how conversations on a topic have evolved over time. Like Rival IQ, it also has competitive analysis features (and even influencer marketing features), but its real strength is in long-range data.

In historical insights, you can unlock data as old as a decade (the nerd in me loves this feature). What was your audience saying about an important topic five years ago? How has their opinion shifted today? What were the most engaging posts on this topic in this timeframe?

In market research, thanks to Keyhole's machine learning system, you can identify emerging trends on any topic. You can see a real-time evolution of how your audience's sentiments are evolving on a subject.

These social media analytics can give you powerful insights into developing your products and services: you can see what has stood the test of time and how the conversation on a topic has changed.

One catch is that the historical insights are only available for X (formerly Twitter). Sure, it has been the go-to place for conversation in the past, but I would've loved it if other social media platforms were included in the historical insights, too. And these reports cost extra — starting at $50 and increasing depending on the volume of X posts you're analyzing.

Pricing: Not publicly available.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, YouTube

4. Social Status

Best social media analytics tool for small businesses running ads and influencer partnerships

Social Status is one of the top social media analytics tools for small businesses running ads and managing influencer partnerships as part of their social media strategy.

If you're a small business that just wants to measure its performance across organic and paid social strategies, Social Status is a pretty solid fit. It provides the key performance indicators (likes, impressions, comments, shares, etc.) and also:

• Ad analytics (only for Meta, LinkedIn, and X)
• Competitor analytics (only in the paid plan)
• Influencer analytics (only in the higher tier plans)
• Customized social media performance reports on higher-tier plans

Social media managers who practice advertising, collect user-generated content, and dabble in organic social media marketing have a lot on their plate (to say the least). Social Status makes it easy to collate all your insights in a single dashboard.

Pricing: Free plan available. Paid plans start at $9 per month for small businesses, and $99 for other users.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, YouTube

5. Siftsy

Best social media analytics tool for analyzing your comments

Comments often reveal the "why" behind the numbers. Ever wish an analytics tool could surface those insights for you? Siftsy does exactly that.

Designed to pull sentiment from comments across multiple channels, Siftsy works like this: upload a CSV of post URLs, tag your campaign, and let the AI do the heavy lifting.

Analyzing your comments can be beneficial in various scenarios:

• When you want to do a qualitative analysis of an influencer partnership
• When you want to get feedback about a product or an experimental social media post
• When you want automated reports about the overall sentiment of a social media campaign

The numeric data in post analytics are great, but combining them with the qualitative comments' sentiment makes them even more powerful. Siftsy's AI even summarizes the key takeaways and highlights valuable insights from specific conversations for you.

Pricing: Not publicly available.

Supported platforms: Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, YouTube

6. Vista Social

Best social media analytics tool for tracking reviews and social metrics

Vista Social takes what Siftsy does a step further. It's not only a social media analytics tool; it can also help you schedule posts, manage your comments and social inbox, and practice social listening.

Where Vista Social really shines is review management. It pulls feedback from multiple sites into one dashboard so you can:

• See every new review from Facebook, Google Business, Yelp, and more side-by-side
• Reply to reviews and social comments without switching tabs
• Create filtered, branded reports that combine social metrics and review sentiment

Pricing: Plans start at $79 per month. Free 14-day trial available with each plan.

Supported platforms: Apple Play Store, Bluesky, Facebook, Google Business, Google Play Store, Instagram, LinkedIn, OpenTable, Pinterest, Reddit, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, TripAdvisor, Trustpilot, Tumblr, X, Yelp, YouTube, and more

7. Typefully

Best social media analytics tool if you’re only focused on X (formerly Twitter)

Typefully is one of the best social media analytics tools for X (formerly Twitter). While it supports multiple social media channels, it aces X like no other. I especially love writing X threads on it — the user experience is great. The "viral thread hooks" examples it contains are also top-notch for inspiration.

Typefully also provides social media metrics that are unique to X. For example, your dashboard would refer to comments as "replies" because that's the unique terminology for X.

A unique metric I love in Typefully is "profile conversion rate," which tells you how many people in your target audience who visited your X profile hit the follow button. This is such a helpful data point because it helps gain insights on:

• How effective is your profile image, bio, and pinned tweet in converting a visitor to a follower
• How your target audience discovers your social media profile through other sources (like web traffic, podcast mentions, etc.)

Apart from this, Typefully provides all the essential social media metrics such as number of posts, follower growth, impressions, profile visits, etc.

Pricing: Free plan available for 15 posts per month. Paid plans start at $16 per month and have compulsory yearly billing.

Supported platforms: Bluesky, LinkedIn, Mastodon, Threads, X

8. Tailwind

Best social media analytics tool for businesses relying on Pinterest traffic

Tailwind is one of the best social media tools for small businesses focused on using Pinterest marketing to drive traffic. Since Pinterest functions differently (it's a social media channel and a search engine), Tailwind has designed its tool to complement both.

What stands out is the Google Analytics integration, which can help determine which pins drive the most traffic to your website. Using this data, you can double down on the most successful pins and recreate them.

For a Pinterest-specific social media analytics platform, you need many more key performance indicators because of how pins, boards, and trends function on the platform. Tailwind delivers. You can access Pinterest analytics from the high level to the individual pin:

• Track engagement metrics for your boards and pins, including trends for repins
• A "Pin Inspector" helps you monitor the insights for individual pins and understand which pins you should reschedule
• Interest heatmaps help gain actionable insights into whether your social posts are resonating with your target audience
• Board insights help you understand which boards of yours are performing the best — and you can filter them for boards garnering the most outbound links, too

When it comes to Pinterest, few social media tools do a better job than Tailwind — and that includes its social media analytics capabilities.

Pricing: Free plan available for five posts per month. Paid plans begin at $29.99 per month.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest

9. DashThis

Best social media analytics tool for an all-in-one marketing dashboard

DashThis isn't a social media tool, exactly — it's a marketing dashboard that happens to be really good at pulling social data into the bigger picture.

If you're the person on your team who has to show how social media fits into the overall marketing strategy (and prove it's worth the investment), DashThis makes that a lot easier. You can combine social metrics with Google Analytics, ad performance, and other marketing data into one report — which is handy when your stakeholders don't want to look at six different dashboards.

DashThis has over 30 integrations to help you connect Google Analytics, Ahrefs, HubSpot, and many more platforms. You can also keep an eye on paid marketing efforts — like TikTok Ads, Meta Business Suite, Pinterest ads, and even Google ads — to provide a combined report of your organic and paid strategy.

I wouldn't recommend using DashThis if you need in-depth social media performance insights — it provides the basic audience insights report, likes, comments, shares, impressions, etc. It's the ability to integrate with other marketing tools in your tech stack (over 30 of them) that makes it stand out.

I also love that each plan has unlimited users, making DashThis perfect for a large marketing team. There's also no cap on how many data sources you can add, so don't worry if your marketing strategy has a ton of moving parts. You can combine them all in this one analytics tool.

Pricing: Plans begin at $54 per month. There's a 15-day free trial with every plan.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, TikTok, YouTube

10. Socialinsider

Best social media analytics tool for AI-driven content pillar insights

Socialinsider is an advanced social media analytics tool that offers AI-driven insights about your content pillars. In the higher tier plans, you can also run an AI-driven competitor analysis that lets you check if a certain pillar works well for a competitor. You can then consider tailoring and using it in your own strategy.

I also love the post tagging feature — here, you can tag and group social media posts and monitor how they're performing collectively. It's just the feature you'd need when you want to monitor how your different social media campaigns or content pillars have performed.

The only catch is the price of Socialinsider is prohibitive for most creators and small teams, since the best features of Socialinsider are restricted to the higher-tier plans.

Pricing: Plans start at $99 per month. All plans have a 14-day free trial.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, X, YouTube

11. Talkwalker

Best social media analytics tool for in-depth audience insights

Talkwalker is an advanced analytics tool for social media monitoring. Audience insights are the standout feature for the platform (now owned by Hootsuite). You can pull insights from customer calls, support tickets, and online communities to find what your audience truly cares about — a great way to find content ideas.

I also love the audience segmentation features. You can slice and dice your data based on audience demographics. This can help garner actionable insights about the various segments of your social media audience — which is especially useful if you're a global brand.

You can also chat with Talkwalker's AI assistant, Yeti, to ask questions about various audience demographics and access relevant insights at your fingertips.

If you wish Talkwalker could also help you manage your social media marketing efforts, you're in luck: Hootsuite acquired Talkwalker in 2024. With Hootsuite, you can schedule your posts, manage your inbox, and measure your social media performance, all in one place.

The snag is that most of Talkwalker's features are only available in the higher-tier Hootsuite plans — which isn't easy on the pocket even with its lowest-tier subscription ($199 per month).

Pricing: Not publicly available.

Supported platforms: Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, X, and more

Let your analytics tools deal with the data

Instead of spending hours crunching numbers, you can focus your time on analyzing what the data tells you: Which are my best types of posts? How can I replicate my previous success? What should I shift in my strategy to improve my return on investment?

And if the tool offers ready-made report templates, even better — you can spin up a polished, share-worthy deck in minutes and get back to the creative work.

Having tested all of these tools, I find Buffer to be one of the easiest to get up and running — especially if you're looking for something that covers both scheduling and analytics without the learning curve. The free plan lets you test whether the interface matches how you think before committing to anything. No credit card needed.

FAQ about social media analytics tools

What is a social media analytics tool?

A social media analytics tool collects data from your social media accounts and presents it in ways that help you understand what's working. This includes metrics like reach, impressions, engagement rate, click-through rate, and audience demographics. Some tools also add competitor comparison, social listening, and predictive insights. The goal is to turn raw numbers into actionable intelligence — knowing not just that a post got 500 likes, but why it did and what to do next.

Why are social media analytics important?

Social media analytics help you prove ROI, identify which content drives traffic and conversions, and optimize your posting strategy based on real data instead of guesswork. Over time, this data helps you create more effective content, grow your audience faster, and make smarter marketing decisions. Teams that track social media metrics and adjust strategy based on data consistently outperform those that post and hope.

What metrics should you track on social media?

The most helpful metrics depend on your goals:

• For awareness: Reach, impressions, and follower growth
• For engagement: Engagement rate, saves, shares, and comments
• For traffic: Click-through rate and link clicks
• For conversions: Conversion rate, cost per lead, and attribution

Most teams should track at minimum: reach, impressions, engagement rate, click-through rate, audience growth, and conversion rate. Use these as your baseline, then drill deeper into the metrics tied to your specific business outcome.

What are the 4 types of social media analytics?

The four types are descriptive (what happened — raw metrics like impressions and clicks), diagnostic (why it happened — content type and timing analysis), predictive (what will happen — trend forecasting based on past data), and prescriptive (what you should do — AI-powered action recommendations). Most analytics tools focus on descriptive and diagnostic. Only premium tools venture into predictive and prescriptive territory.

How do you choose a social media analytics tool?

Start with these questions: How many accounts do you manage? Do you need competitor benchmarking or just your own data? Do you need automated reporting for clients or stakeholders? What's your budget? Then test the free tier or trial of 2–3 tools that fit your criteria. Look at ease of use, data accuracy, reporting capabilities, and integrations with your existing stack. Don't get sold on features you don't need — choose the simplest tool that solves your core problem.

What is the difference between social media analytics and insights?

"Insights" is the term social platforms use for their native analytics (Instagram Insights, TikTok Analytics, etc.). "Analytics" usually refers to third-party tools that aggregate data from multiple platforms and add features like competitor comparison, cross-platform reporting, and trend analysis. Native insights are free but limited to your own data on a single platform. Third-party analytics tools cost money but give you more flexibility and cross-platform visibility.

Do you need a social media analytics tool if platforms already provide data?

Native analytics are useful for basic performance tracking, but they have real limits. They only show your own data, don't compare you to competitors, are hard to customize, and don't integrate with the rest of your marketing stack. If you're managing multiple accounts, need competitor benchmarking, or build reports for stakeholders, a third-party tool is worth the investment. If you're a solo creator tracking basic performance on one platform, native analytics might be enough to start.

How often should you check your social media analytics?

Most creators and social media managers benefit from checking analytics at least once a week. A quick weekly review helps you spot patterns — which posts performed best, when your audience was most active, and what topics resonated. A deeper monthly review is useful for evaluating long-term trends and refining your overall social media strategy. If you're running a campaign, daily check-ins make sense until it wraps up.

What's the difference between analytics tools and social media management tools?

Dedicated analytics tools focus purely on measuring performance and generating reports. Social media management tools combine analytics with other features like scheduling posts, managing comments, and storing content ideas. For many creators and small teams, a management tool with built-in analytics is the best option — having everything in one place just makes life easier. But if you need very deep analytics (like competitive benchmarking or sentiment analysis), a standalone analytics tool is worth adding to your stack.

More social media analytics resources

• 2026 Social Media Benchmarks You Can Use to Guide Your Strategy
• TikTok Analytics for Creators and Brands: The Metrics That Actually Matter
• New in Buffer: LinkedIn Profile Analytics
• 12 Social Media Metrics You Should Be Tracking (And Why)

I have over 15,000 followers on Instagram, and I've helped grow Buffer's Instagram account to over 100K.

One thing I've learned on my journey is that there are no definitive “growth hacks” for increasing your Instagram followers. But don't worry, there are still plenty of practical things you can do to build a solid growth strategy that actually works.

I've tested a lot of growth strategies over the years and seen firsthand what really works, what burns you out, and what actually fuels growth over time.

A larger, engaged following opens real doors — brand partnerships, monetization opportunities, social proof that attracts even more followers, and a direct channel to drive traffic to your website or products. It's worth getting right.

In fact, I've seen a noticeable surge in reach and follower growth in recent months on both accounts with these exact strategies — Buffer's Instagram reach grew over 2× in the last quarter alone. They really are tried and tested.

In this article, I'll walk you through 13 strategies I recommend — whether you're looking to grow beyond a plateau, or you're starting to grow your Instagram following from scratch. These tactics focus on sustainable, organic growth — the kind that compounds over time. Let's get into them.

In this article, I'll walk you through 13 strategies I recommend — whether you're looking to grow beyond a plateau, or you're starting to grow your Instagram following from scratch.

These tactics focus on sustainable, organic growth — the kind that compounds over time. Let's get into them.

Key takeaways

• Posting 3–5 times per week grows followers 2× faster than posting 1–2 times, based on Buffer's State of Social Engagement report, which analyzed 52 million+ posts across 200K+ accounts
• Instagram Reels generate 36% more reach than other post types — best for attracting new followers
• Carousels drive 12% more engagement than other formats — best for retaining existing followers
• Replying to comments boosts engagement by 21%
• Optimize your bio with keywords in your name field to appear in Instagram search results
• Cross-promote your Instagram handle on other platforms to convert existing audiences into followers
• Avoid buying followers — fake accounts lower engagement rate and may trigger Instagram penalties

1. Build an Instagram growth strategy before chasing followers

Instagram growth without a strategy is just posting into the void. Here's how to make sure every post is pulling its weight.

Having a clear idea of where Instagram fits into your overall social media marketing strategy will not only help you gain more followers, but also help you get more relevant content ideas for Instagram.

But how do you create an Instagram growth strategy?

Step 1. Get clear on your goals

Instead of learning how to get more followers on Instagram, step back and reflect on what you plan to do with your follower count.

Do you want to build a personal brand? Or raise brand awareness for your company? Perhaps you want to drive website traffic. Maybe you want to collect more user-generated content.

Whatever it is, define it clearly — with measurable milestones — to put intention behind your Instagram strategy.

Step 2. Get a 360-view of your target audience

Knowing the basic demographics is crucial. But also go beyond that and deeply understand what your audience struggles with and how you can help them resolve their challenges using your Instagram content strategy.

Next, get a 360-degree view of your ideal follower. I would start by clarifying three simple things.

Who am I talking to? What am I helping them with? And what do I want them to feel when they land on my profile?

This will allow you to create content that truly resonates with your community — helping you gain more Instagram followers.

Natasha Pierre — creator and host of the Shine Online Podcast — says losing sight of your ideal follower in exchange for virality is the single biggest mistake creators make.

"People often focus so much on going viral and reaching as many people as possible that they lose sight of the ideal follower they're trying to reach," she says.

"You could go viral today, and if you're reaching mostly the wrong people, chances are it won't result in them following you. [Even if they do], it would lead to Instagram followers who aren't engaged."

"Taking the time to reflect on who your ideal follower is will help you create specific-to-them content, which will not only result in better growth but quality new followers."

Step 3. Define your brand voice and aesthetic

Even if you're a creator and not a company, it's worth crafting a social media marketing voice that's uniquely you, so Instagram users can identify your posts without seeing the username.

Brand voice is hard to track or quantify, but it's non-negotiable to be memorable. On Instagram, you can also define your aesthetic along with your brand voice. Use brand colors, stick to a consistent content theme, and have a personality.

Step 4. Create content pillar themes and stick to them

Decide on a niche for your Instagram account. Have a few overarching topics you'll post about, and don't deviate from them too much. This has many benefits:

• You don't have to constantly reinvent the wheel for brainstorming great content ideas.
• Your Instagram community starts recognizing you for the type of content you create.
• You don't get distracted by the new, shiny thing, and keep revising your Instagram strategy.

2. Optimize your Instagram bio

Your bio is doing more heavy lifting than you think. It's the first thing someone sees when they land on your profile — and it's often what decides whether they hit Follow or keep scrolling.

The skincare company, Kinship, is an excellent example of how to ace the Instagram bio.

They use the right Instagram category for their account (health/beauty) to instantly establish their niche. Following this is one line about their brand mentions, another about what they sell, and the last one about their strongest features. They've also added multiple links for their Instagram followers to tap on and learn more.

Here are the elements you need to nail for the perfect Instagram bio:

• A descriptive category
• A straightforward description of what you do and/or what you sell
• A touch of brand personality
• Links that lead somewhere useful, like your website or a Buffer Start Page

Used pinned posts in your profile grid

Treat your grid like a storefront by making sure your most compelling content is right up front. Use pinned posts in your profile grid that showcase your best work or a reel that answers your most commonly asked questions.

Want to show up in more searches?

The Instagram algorithm prioritizes search results containing keywords in the name and username. Add one or two keywords that describe what you do right in your name field or handle — think "vegan recipes" or "wedding photographer."

For example, creator Hannah Hargrove has the keywords “Baby + Toddler Nutrition” on her Instagram account, right next to her name. Her username is also “tinyeatersnutrition” — these specifics instantly tell you what to expect from her Instagram account.

Instagram users searching for “toddler nutrition” will also find her account pop up in search (that’s how I found her) — helping her gain more Instagram followers.

Just don't go overboard with keywords in your Instagram name field — it'll come across as spammy and water down their purpose. Use just a few phrases that tell people what your Instagram account is about.

3. Cross-promote your Instagram handle on other channels

Redirecting potential customers from other channels to your Instagram account is an easy way to gain more Instagram followers quickly — especially if you already have a strong presence on other social media platforms.

For example, at Buffer, we have our Instagram link on our website footer.

Here are the most effective ways to cross-promote and increase your follower count. Add your Instagram page's link to:

• Your product packaging
• Your blogs (when relevant)
• Marketing and transactional emails
• Your website's footer and/or sidebar
• Social media posts from team members
• Your and your employees' email signature
• Bios on other social media platforms like TikTok and YouTube
• Networking events and webinars (Use your profile’s Instagram QR code for in-person events)

Cross-promotion will help you increase the probability of being in front of relevant users on Instagram. Existing followers from other social media platforms likely already know you and the kind of content you create — they're quality followers; the ones who are most likely to enjoy and engage with your Instagram posts.

4. Post 3–5 times per week for consistent growth

Posting 3–5 times per week is the optimal frequency for Instagram follower growth. According to Buffer's State of Social Engagement report, which analyzed 52 million+ posts across 200K+ accounts, accounts at this frequency grow followers 2× faster and see 12% more reach per post.

That's a big payoff for just one or two extra posts a week.

Every post you share is another chance to reach new audiences

Remember, posting three times a week for three months will teach you more than planning for three weeks. If you want a shot at a breakout post, you have to enter the lottery as often as you can.

If you're able to share more often — say 6–9 times weekly — that's even better for growth. But if your time or creative energy is limited, aiming for 3–5 high-quality posts per week is a great, sustainable goal.

A smarter way to create more content sustainably

As creators or marketers, we often make the assumption that all of our followers have seen every single piece of content we create, but in reality, only a small portion of our audience will see a particular post.

So don't be shy to repurpose existing content. This doesn't just mean repurposing content you've posted on other channels (though that is a great option, if you're not doing that already), but also within the same platform. Don't be afraid of tweaking content that performed well and sharing it again.

Some examples could be to turn a series of Instagram Stories into a reel or an insightful caption into a poignant video.

Here’s a great example of the latter from @stanforcreators:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Stan — Your All-in-One Creator Store (@stanforcreators)

Stay consistent with a content calendar and batching

Another smart way to stick to consistent posting (on any platform) is to create a content calendar — a document sharing exactly what you need to post and when. If you've created and scheduled posts to go out in advance, you aren't relying on inspiration alone to stick to your posting schedule.

If you want to level up even further, try blocking out time to create your posts in batches. Content batching is the method of creating social media posts in bulk so you can add them to your content calendar. Your future self will thank you.

Instead of manually posting the posts in your content calendar, use Instagram scheduling tools like Buffer to automate the process.

You can't be everywhere all the time

To build a scalable system to grow on Instagram, you have to work smarter. To keep up with my posting frequency, I use Buffer to batch-create content ahead of time and give myself a longer content runway.

My content autopublishes when I'm offline, so I can unplug and recharge while growth continues in the background. I can also analyze my Instagram posts to track what's landing, schedule posts on multiple platforms, respond to comments, and crosspost to TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, and more — all from one dashboard.

5. Find your best times to post on Instagram

Posting when your followers are online gives your content a better shot at more reach. More reach means more chances to attract new followers.

According to our analysis of over two million Instagram posts, the best times to post on Instagram are Thursday at 9 a.m., Wednesday at 12 p.m., and Wednesday at 6 p.m.

If you want to understand when your followers are online, Instagram insights can tell you that in four simple steps:

1. Open your Instagram app and navigate to insights using the hamburger menu (the three horizontal lines) on your account. If you're on Instagram web, just click on Dashboard.
2. Click on Total followers if you're on the Instagram app or select Account if you're on the web.
3. Scroll down to the bottom of this page and look for Most active times to understand when your Instagram followers are online. You'll be able to toggle between hours for every day of the week or look at specific days.

Want to take it up a notch? Use Buffer's analytics to determine the best times to post, the best types of posts, and the best post frequency — all in one tab.

Buffer uses data from your previous posts and followers' activity and organizes the numbers in a way that's easy to understand.

Along with the time, also consider when your Instagram posts would be more relevant logically. A step-by-step video recipe will perform better after working hours when people cook. On the other hand, coffee shop Instagram Stories might do better at the 2 p.m. slump.

Experiment with posting times to determine when you reach new audiences (and gain new followers).

6. Write compelling captions

It's enticing to skimp on Instagram captions when you've toiled to create the perfect carousel or video. But Instagram captions hold more weight than you think: They can either nudge someone to follow you or scroll past you without looking.

Plus, the longer someone lingers on a post — particularly a reel — is a strong signal to the Instagram algorithm that your content holds value. So give folks something to read.

For example, wellness brand Cosmix doesn't simply write, "shop on our website!" on its Instagram posts. It explained the ingredients used, how Cosmix products help specific issues, and mentions the studies that back up these claims.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Cosmix - Superfoods (@cosmixwellness)

Writing the perfect Instagram caption is about understanding your audience and the context of your post. If you're writing an educational post, it makes sense to have a longer caption. But when you're sharing an aesthetic product image, shorter is sweeter.

Similarly, also think about captions based on content formats: Instagram Stories need a shorter caption (or text on media) because your followers view them quickly, but carousel posts might need more context.

If coming up with captions isn't your forte, try Buffer's AI assistant to generate a rough first draft in seconds.

If you need more inspiration, Buffer also has a free template library to help you scour through hundreds of ideas for your captions and posts. You can also filter them based on post type (hot take, opinion, promotion, etc.), goal, format, and creator type (individual vs. business).

Whenever you're in a creative slump about what to post and how to write a captivating caption, just go to the template library and scroll until you find something interesting you can use.

Nail your call-to-action

What action are you hoping someone takes after consuming your content? What's the value being delivered in the end? Maybe you want them to listen to a podcast episode. Maybe you're crowdsourcing ideas, or maybe you're asking for their opinion on something.

Here are a few examples:

• Which tip was most helpful?
• Agree or disagree?
• Want a part two?

Invite your community in and create space for thoughtful action.

7. Use relevant hashtags, locations, and keywords

People often search for relevant keywords, hashtags, and locations to find the type of content they're looking for. If you rank for these searches, you expose your Instagram content to potential followers.

Keywords

Use keywords related to your post (without stuffing them). Think of the phrases and words your audience might be using to search for the type of content you're creating. Instagram picks up keywords from captions, visuals, and hashtags — so use the relevant keywords in all these places.

How do you find the relevant keywords? Run a search for the phrases you think your audience might use and see which keywords other brands are using. Instagram will also fill in related terms when you search for a broad keyword, just like on Google.

Hashtags

How many hashtags should you use? Instagram recommends using 3–5 relevant hashtags with every post. Mix popular and niche hashtags to increase your chances of ranking on the Explore page when someone searches for the hashtags in your niche. This will allow you to make the most of Instagram hashtags without cluttering your posts.

How do you find relevant hashtags?

How do you find relevant hashtags? You can search niche hashtags to find popular Instagram hashtags related to your posts. You can also use hashtag generators like Buffer's free hashtag generator to find relevant hashtags.

Simply share what your post is about, click on Generate hashtags, and Buffer will share a list of hashtags you can use.

Buffer can also help you curate a list of hashtags and organize them into groups using the hashtag manager. For example, make a group of product-specific hashtags and another for niche or industry-specific hashtags. Select from your pre-saved groups on Buffer and add hashtags to your scheduled Instagram posts with one click.

Location

For local discovery, add in a geotag as well. Tagging your city, neighborhood, or event space helps Instagram surface your post to people browsing that location — a simple step that can land your content on the Explore page for nearby users. This might also help your content surface in followers' Friends Maps.

8. Track your Instagram analytics to find what works

Regularly checking your Instagram analytics is key to understanding what's helping you get more followers on Instagram. You might find that your audience responds best to entertaining reels, but educational posts work best as carousels. Maybe you discover Instagram giveaways are best for engagement, but they don't help you gain followers.

Watch closely for those patterns and evolve your content strategy as you go. Instagram has native analytics on its app, but they're pretty limited. You can't see your individual posts' performance in a single window to analyze them side by side, nor can you handpick metrics important to you.

It's better to use a third-party tool like Buffer's analytics to get all the data at a glance and even make custom reports for stakeholders.

Which metric is the most important to track?

It depends on your Instagram goals and strategy. For example, if you're testing a new hashtag, knowing the number of new followers is more important than tracking likes from your current followers. But if you're experimenting with posting times, keeping an eye on impressions is more important.

I like to focus on real plays, saves, shares, and follower sources. This saves so much time by showing me where to double down instead of creating content just to fill the feed.

9. Collaborate with Instagram creators or other small businesses

This is a personal favorite of mine, and one of the fastest ways to grow on Instagram: Post collaboration content. That might look like a co-created carousel or a reel, story takeovers, and tagging each other, joint giveaways, or shared resources. The possibilities are endless.

Instagram collab posts with other creators via influencer marketing or partnerships with small businesses are a win-win because they expose both parties to potential Instagram followers. The critical bit is ensuring you partner with a company or creator who aligns with your values and whose followers' demographics and interests overlap with your target audience.

For example, the period tracker app, Flo, collaborated with Charity Ekezie and created a paid Instagram post to highlight the company's social initiative to offer premium features for free in countries like Ethiopia and Haiti.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Charity Ekezie (@itssucrepea)

These posts are shown on both accounts — meaning all followers of your creator partner will see the shared post (and, by extension, your Instagram profile and small business).

If influencers with over a hundred thousand followers are out of your budget, run a micro-influencer campaign. Micro-influencers (accounts with 10K–100K followers) typically see 2–3× higher engagement rates than larger accounts because their audiences are more tightly knit and trust their recommendations more.

How to find collaboration partners

Here are a few methods that work well:

• Search niche hashtags for creators whose content aligns with your brand — look for consistent engagement (comments, not just likes) rather than follower count alone
• Use Instagram's suggested accounts feature — when you follow a creator in your niche, Instagram surfaces similar accounts you might want to connect with
• Check who's creating content your audience already engages with — look at who your followers follow, comment on, and share
• Use influencer discovery tools like Modash to save time and filter by niche, engagement rate, and audience demographics

You don't need to restrict yourself to partnering with individual creators. You can also form partnerships with other small businesses. Take a look at how LinkedIn and Headspace collaborated to create a post about recovering from job loss.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Headspace (@headspace)

Collaborating on Instagram doesn't only mean creating a shared post, either. You could also:

• Go live with a creator
• Do an Instagram account takeover
• Repost Instagram content from an influencer's profile to your Instagram Stories
• Post videos created by them natively on your brand account (with permission)

10. Experiment with different types of Instagram posts

It's been a long time since Instagram was just a photo app. The platform has introduced many formats, including short-form video content like reels, stories, and carousel posts.

Once in a while, I like to post something unexpected. Testing different formats gives you the space to experiment and learn, and offers fresh insights into what resonates more with your audience.

Which type of posts will help you get the most reach?

According to Buffer's State of Social Engagement report, Instagram Reels get 36% more reach than other post types, while carousels drive 12% more engagement. Use Reels to attract new followers and carousels to deepen engagement with existing ones.

How to build your Instagram Reels muscles

Creating reels can feel like a heavier lift if you're not super comfortable in front of the camera, but it's a muscle you build over time. Here are some fairly easy ideas:

• Record a bunch of videos throughout the day, like you on a walk, drinking coffee, working on your laptop, socializing, and stitch them together with a compelling voice-over that tells a story.
• Try filming a talking head video with easy-to-follow tips, plus captions and fun sound effects.
• Capture a quiet moment of you sitting in one place, maybe just enjoying a cup of coffee, and add a question as text overlay, and then expand in captions.

The more you film, the more comfortable you get with the process, and that in turn sparks even more inspiration for your next video.

Remember, reach isn’t the same as engagement

Our research — the same one that found reels get the most reach — also found that carousels get 12% more engagement than other content formats.

The hook matters more than the aesthetic

To increase engagement, your first slide should hook people in with a hard-hitting truth or address a problem that your audience is actively trying to solve. For example, instead of "Tips for creators," try something like, "If your reels aren't getting views, try this."

Don’t sleep on Instagram Live

Going Live sends a push notification to followers, places you first in the stories row, and lets you answer questions in real time. Try a fifteen-minute Q&A, a product unboxing, or co-host a Live with a creator in your niche to tap into their audience, too.

11. Talk to your audience in comments and stories

Social media is a two-way street. Every single interaction — whether that's via interactive Instagram Stories or responding to their comments — puts you on someone's radar. It's a portal to more exposure and an opportunity to build a real community.

Remember, getting more Instagram followers isn't just about adding new followers; it's also about maintaining your follower count. You don't want to lose your existing community because you're unresponsive. Engaging with your audience shows that you care about them, take their feedback seriously, and believe in reciprocity. These real relationships lead to real growth.

Pay attention to meaningful conversations in your own comments and make an effort to engage with posts from others in your niche. When they see you supporting them, they'll often come back and support you.

The yogurt brand Chobani is a good example. They respond to almost every comment they receive.

Responding to every comment might be unrealistic once you start receiving thousands of them (good problem to have), but do your best to respond to as many queries as possible.

Buffer's Community feature makes it easy to respond to all comments from all your platforms, right there on the Buffer dashboard. You can set up notifications, filter and sort your comments, and even create a new post from a reply.

Show up in stories and use engagement tools

Stories are where trust builds. People appreciate lived experiences that give them a peek into a problem you solved, a lesson you learned, or a chapter of life you survived.

I host a podcast called The Lavender Fix, and I often use story polls to understand what topics my audience is most interested in, link a sticker to a new episode, or share a casual behind-the-scenes moment from one of my recording sessions.

12. Avoid buying followers (and other growth shortcuts that backfire)

It's tempting to buy Instagram followers to inflate your follower number. But it's worth remembering that fake followers aren't going to interact with your Instagram profile.

They'll either be bots or fake accounts — not real Instagram followers (and definitely not relevant ones). So your follower count might soar, but your engagement rate will plummet.

Fake Instagram followers also hurt your credibility. Potential collaborators and your audience will sooner or later get suspicious of the mismatch between your number of followers and engagement rate. This can make your audience lose trust in you and harm your personal brand in the long term.

If that wasn't enough, the Instagram algorithm also pushes posts with authentic engagement. The platform might penalize you for disguising fake accounts as real followers.

Other shortcuts to avoid

Buying followers isn't the only growth tactic that backfires. A few more to steer clear of:

• Follow-unfollow tactics — Following hundreds of accounts hoping they'll follow back, then unfollowing them, makes you look spammy and Instagram's algorithm may flag the behavior. It also attracts low-quality followers who'll never engage with your content.
• Engagement pods — Groups where members agree to like and comment on each other's posts artificially inflate your metrics without building real reach. Instagram has gotten better at detecting these patterns, and the engagement rarely translates to genuine follower growth.
• Posting inconsistently — Going from five posts a week to zero for a month confuses the algorithm and your audience. It's better to post three times a week consistently than to post daily for two weeks and then disappear.

The common thread: anything that games the system instead of serving your audience tends to backfire eventually. Sustainable growth is slower, but it's the kind that actually compounds.

13. Get verified on Instagram

Having the coveted blue checkmark next to your Instagram account is a badge of instant credibility. It helps you stand out in search results, avoids impersonation, and even get higher engagement rates.

If your aim is to increase your Instagram growth rate, getting verified will undoubtedly help. But how do you get verified on Instagram? Don't worry if you're not famous — the blue check is no longer exclusively reserved for public figures.

The easiest way is to buy a subscription through your Instagram profile. (There are certain eligibility requirements you have to meet, like adhering to Meta's minimum activity requirements, but that shouldn't be hard.)

Getting more followers on Instagram isn’t a one-time affair

These 13 strategies aren't a checklist you complete once — they're habits you build over time. The accounts that grow fastest are the ones that stay consistent, keep experimenting, and actually talk to their audience.

It's time-consuming and laborious to manage the planning, posting, engaging, and tracking manually. Having an all-in-one tool — like Buffer — lets you handle all of this from one dashboard. If you want to try it, there's a free plan to get started.

FAQ about getting more followers on Instagram

How can I get my first 1,000 followers quickly but organically on Instagram?

Focus on content that people want to share. Post short, engaging reels, use clear keywords and a handful of relevant hashtags, and add strong calls to action in your captions. Comment on posts in your niche, reply to every comment you receive, and cross-promote your handle on other platforms. A steady posting schedule — made easier with a tool like Buffer — helps you show up in the feed more often and reach new people faster.

What is the 5-3-1 rule on Instagram, and does it work?

The 5-3-1 rule is a daily engagement habit: like five posts, leave three thoughtful comments, and follow one new, relevant account. The goal is to spark genuine conversations so more people check out your profile and follow you back. It's simple, free, and a good way to build community — as long as your interactions stay authentic and on-topic.

How often should I post if I want to grow my follower count?

Accounts posting 3–5 times per week grow followers 2× faster than those posting 1–2 times, based on Buffer's analysis of 52M+ Instagram posts. Mix formats — Reels for reach (36% more than other types) and carousels for engagement (12% more). Schedule posts for your audience's peak activity times using Instagram Insights or Buffer analytics.

How to increase Instagram followers for free?

Every strategy in this guide is free. The most effective organic tactics are: posting Reels consistently (they get 36% more reach), optimizing your bio with searchable keywords, engaging with your community through comments and stories, using 3–5 relevant hashtags per post, and cross-promoting your handle on other platforms where you already have an audience. Consistency matters more than any single tactic — accounts that post 3–5 times per week see 2× faster follower growth.

How can I optimize my Instagram profile to get more followers?

Start with your bio: use a descriptive category, write a clear one-line description of what you do, and add a link to your website or Start Page. Add one or two keywords to your name field (like "wedding photographer" or "vegan recipes") so you appear in Instagram search results. Pin your best-performing posts or a FAQ reel to the top of your grid, and make sure your profile photo is recognizable at thumbnail size. For a deep dive, see our guide to Instagram bio ideas.

What type of Instagram content gets the most followers?

According to Buffer's State of Social Engagement report, Instagram Reels generate 36% more reach than other post types — making them the best format for attracting new followers. For keeping existing followers engaged, carousels drive 12% more engagement. The most effective approach is a mix: use Reels to get discovered and carousels to build deeper connections with the followers you've already earned.

More Instagram resources

• The Best Time to Post on Instagram: We Analyzed 2 Million+ Posts to Find Out
• Instagram 101: A Step-By-Step Guide on How to Use Instagram
• How to Get Verified on Instagram: 2 Ways To Get Your Blue Check
• How the Instagram Algorithm Works
• Trending Sounds on Instagram (+ How to Use Them)
• How to Use Instagram for Business: The Complete Guide
• How to Create Your Own Influencer Media Kit (+ Examples from Creators)