You may wonder a question a thousand sleepless nights: “How often should I post to Instagram?”
Of course, there is way more to a successful social media strategy than just posting on Instagram the optimal number of times: it’s not a magic formula, let’s get that straight.
Still, there’re tons of pressure on to find that sweet spot of frequency. You don’t want to overwhelm your followers or seem like you’re spamming the news feed. You also don’t want to miss opportunities for exposure.
But how much is too much? How much is too little? Then when you’ve found that out, when’s the best time to post?)
Well, great news: you can stop your social posting panic spiral. We’ve got all the info you need about exactly how often you should be posting to Instagram to really optimize your reach — without annoying your followers.
We made the research for insights to explore the perfect number of times a day (or week) to publish Instagram posts. In general, we recommend posting between 3-7 times per week on Instagram. Keep reading for more in-depth information.
Every Instagram account is different, so testing and analyzing your results is the most important. However, read on for a detailed breakdown of some general rules to use as a starting point… then, you can start trying on your Instagram account and take experience.
How often to post on Instagram
We recommend posting to your Instagram feed 2-3 times per week, and no more than 1x posts per day. You can post Stories more frequently.
During Instagram’s Creator Week in June 2021, Instagram chief Adam Mosseri recommended that posting 2 feed posts per week and 2 Stories a day is great for building a following on the app.
To keep up with your competitors (or frenemies!) it’s probably essential to note that businesses post an average of 1.56 posts to their feed a day. This might seem like a lot, but a social media content calendar can help you to manage and keep your workflow.
For example, the Instagram account of Hootsuite posts to their main feed 2 to 3 times each week, and to Stories 2 to 3 times a week.
Brayden Cohen said that consider how often your followers need to see your posts, social marketing team lead. “Focus on building a regular cadence: you can increase your followers by 2x by just posting weekly consistently, compared to those who post less frequently than once a week.”
Key Instagram statistics to remember when publishing Instagram posts:
- Instagram has 3.76 billion daily visitors.
- 500 million daily Stories users
- A user spends an average of 30 minutes a day scrolling through Instagram
- 81% of Instagram users use the app to find products and services
- 63% of users who are from America check Instagram at least once a day
As with all things social, finding the best frequency to publish posts on any social media platform is going to require some trial and error. And Instagram is not an exception.
“Increase in key performance metrics such as clicks and high-quality engagements (comments and shares over likes) is fundamentally due to whether a piece of content adds value to me as the reader.”
In a nutshell: The quality of content matters more than quantity. While publish more content may help to some extent, the more relevant and helpful your content is to the audience, the better your social channels will perform.
“In a similar way to how organic search has pivoted from being focused on the keyword to the intent behind the keyword, the same can be said for social”. “Social algorithms are now running emphasis on the kinds of content which will be helpful for users, rather than just provide them with everything that is posted. “
So, there’s no perfect answer to this Big Juicy Question about how often you should post to Instagram, but at least you’ve known where to start.
Now, it’s time for the fun part: create some compelling, engaging content and get it scheduled to go out into the world! Prep your posts in advance to hit those frequency sweet spots with a scheduling tool — get started with our complete guide to scheduling your social media posts.