How to Analyze Instagram Video Content

Knowing how your Instagram videos perform is the fastest way to grow your account and connect with your audience. Instead of guessing what content works, you can use data to see exactly what people love, save, and share. This article will show you how to find and understand the key analytics for your Instagram Reels, Stories, and other video content so you can refine your strategy and create videos that truly deliver.

Why Bother Analyzing Your Instagram Video Performance?

Diving into your video analytics might seem like extra work, but it’s the difference between posting into the void and building a strategy that gets results. When you regularly review your video data, you move from guesswork to informed decision-making.

Here’s what you gain:

• Audience Understanding: Analytics tell you what your audience genuinely finds interesting, entertaining, or useful. A spike in saves on a tutorial Reel tells you they crave educational content, while high shares on a funny video show you what type of humor clicks.
• Refined Content Strategy: Stop wasting time on content that falls flat. By identifying the formats, topics, and styles that consistently perform well, you can double down on what works and cut what doesn't. This streamlines your content creation process and boosts your overall performance.
• Faster Growth: The Instagram algorithm favors content that keeps users engaged. By analyzing metrics like watch time and shares, you learn how to create videos that hook viewers, which signals to Instagram that your content is valuable and should be shown to more people.
• Proof of ROI: For businesses, analytics connect content efforts to business goals. Metrics like website-driven clicks from Stories or a surge in profile visits after a popular Reel demonstrate a clear return on the time and resources you invest in video.

First Things First: Where to Find Your Video Analytics

Before you can analyze anything, you need to know where your data lives. To access Instagram’s built-in analytics, known as Insights, you must have a Creator or Business account. If you’re still on a Personal account, making the switch is free and only takes a minute in your account settings.

Once you’re set up, here’s how to find your analytics:

1. Navigate to your profile page.
2. Tap the "Professional Dashboard" button right below your bio.
3. Under "Account Insights," tap "See all."

This takes you to the main Insights overview. From here, you can drill down into the performance of specific content types. In the "Content You Shared" section, you can tap on Reels, Stories, or Live to see all your posted content and sort it by different metrics.

For a Specific Reel:

1. Open the Reel you want to analyze.
2. Tap the three dots (...) on the right side of the screen.
3. Select "View Insights" from the menu.

For a Specific Story:

1. Open your current Story or an archived Story in your Story Highlights. Ensure to select insights before the full 24-hour expiration of each post.
2. Swipe up on the Story you want to check.
3. Tap the bar chart icon to see the detailed analytics.

The Most Important Instagram Video Metrics to Track

Now that you know where to find the numbers, let’s talk about what they actually mean. Looking at a dashboard full of data can be overwhelming, so focus on the metrics that tell you the most about viewer behavior and content quality.

Metrics for Reach & Engagement

These metrics tell you how many people saw your video and how they interacted with it. They measure the initial impact and appeal of your content.

• Accounts Reached: This is the number of unique accounts that saw your video at least once. Reach is a great measure of awareness. A high reach means your video broke out beyond your existing follower base, likely thanks to the algorithm pushing it on the Explore page or Reels tab.
• Plays / Views: This is the total number of times your video was played. For Reels, this includes replays. A high number of plays compared to your reach could indicate that people watched your Reel multiple times, which is a strong positive signal to the algorithm. For Stories and in-feed videos, a view is counted after just three seconds.
• Likes: The most basic form of engagement. While nice to have, Likes are a relatively passive action. Treat them as a baseline indicator of approval, but don't obsess over them.
• Comments: Comments require more effort than Likes and signal a stronger connection with your content. They show that your video sparked a conversation, made people think, or prompted a question. Fostering comments helps build a community around your account.
• Saves: When someone saves your video, they're bookmarking it to come back to later. This is one of the most powerful engagement metrics. It tells the algorithm that your content is highly valuable, useful, or evergreen. Educational content (like how-to guides), useful lists, and inspirational videos often generate high saves.
• Shares: Shares (via DMs or to someone's Story) are another top-tier metric. They mean your content was so good that a viewer wanted someone else to see it. Humorous, inspiring, or highly relatable videos tend to get shared the most. Shares are a key driver of viral growth, as they introduce your content to new, targeted audiences.

Metrics for Retention & Viewer Interest

These metrics go deeper than initial engagement, telling you how long people actually watched your video. This is what truly measures how captivating your content is.

• Watch Time and Average Watch Time (Reels): These might be the most important metrics for Reels success. Total Watch Time is the combined amount of time everyone spent watching your video. Average Watch Time is the average duration a single person watched. If your Reel is 30 seconds and the average watch time is 32 seconds, it means people are watching it all the way through and then replaying the beginning - a massive green flag for the algorithm.
• Story View-Through Behavior: In Story insights, pay attention to the "Navigation" section. This shows how people moved through your Story slides.
• Completion Rate: While Instagram doesn’t provide an explicit "completion rate" metric, you can get a sense of it using your Reels watch time. Divide the Average Watch Time by the total video duration. A rate over 90-100% (indicating replays) is fantastic. For longer in-feed videos, a high completion rate is less common but still what you should aim for. A great hook in the first three seconds is your best tool for improving retention.

Metrics for Audience Action & Conversion

These metrics tell you if your video inspired someone to take a specific action, connecting your content directly to business goals.

• Profile Activity (Profile Visits & Follows): Found in Reel insights, this shows how many people visited your profile or followed you directly after watching that specific video. A high number here means your video was so impressive that it made people want to see more from you. This is the clearest measure of converting a viewer into a fan or potential customer.
• Website Clicks / Link Clicks: If you use the "link sticker" in your Stories or have a call-to-action (CTA) telling people to click the link in your bio, this is how you measure the result. It's a key metric for driving traffic to your blog, products, or landing pages.

A Practical Workflow for Analyzing Your Video Data

Looking at data is one thing, turning it into actionable insights is another. Follow this simple process a couple of times a month to stay on top of your performance.

Step 1: Collect Your Data

Go to your Professional Dashboard and select a time frame (e.g., Last 30 Days). Focus on one content type at a time, like Reels.

Step 2: Identify Your Top Performers

Sort your Reels by your most important metric. If your goal is brand awareness, sort by Accounts Reached. If your goal is to build a library of valuable content, sort by Saves.

Step 3: Analyze "What Worked"

Look at your top 3-5 videos. What do they have in common? Ask yourself:

• Topic: Was it a tutorial, behind-the-scenes, a trend, or customer spotlight?
• Format: Was it a talking head video, a voiceover with B-roll, or a time-lapse?
• Hook: What happened in the first 3 seconds? Was it a bold statement, a question, or snappy visuals?
• Audio: Did you use a trending sound, original audio, or a popular song?
• Call to Action: Did you ask people to comment, save, or visit your profile?

Step 4: Analyze Your Bottom Performers

Do the same for your worst-performing videos for the same time period. What were the commonalities there? Often, low-performing videos have a slow intro, unclear value, or poor audio/visual quality.

Step 5: Form a Hypothesis and Test It

Based on your analysis, form a simple theory. For example: “Videos where I use a trending sound and share a quick tip get the most saves and reach. I will try to post two more videos like that in the next two weeks.”

This cycle of analyzing, hypothesizing, and testing is the engine of a successful content strategy. You’re no longer throwing spaghetti at the wall, you're using data as your guide.

Final Thoughts

Analyzing your Instagram video performance brings clarity to your content strategy, helping you understand your audience on a deeper level and create content that truly hits the mark. By moving beyond simple likes and followers, you can focus on the engagement and retention signals the algorithm values, leading to more sustainable growth and a stronger community.

Of course, manually exporting data or checking insights one video at a time can get tedious as your account grows. That’s where we built tools to simplify the process. With Graphed, we help you connect your Instagram account and other marketing platforms (like your email service or Shopify store) to get a complete picture of your performance in one place. You can use simple, conversational language to build real-time dashboards and reports, letting you see how your videos directly contribute to business goals without ever having to touch a spreadsheet again.