How to Connect Instagram to Looker Studio
Tired of manually screenshotting your Instagram Insights to share with your team or clients? Moving that data into a Looker Studio (now Google Data Studio) dashboard gives you a powerful, centralized view of your performance alongside your other marketing channels. This guide will show you exactly how to connect Instagram to Looker Studio step-by-step.
Why Bother Connecting Instagram to Looker Studio?
While the native Instagram app provides decent analytics, it lives in a silo. Porting that data into Looker Studio unlocks a more professional and efficient way to handle your reporting. Here’s why it’s worth the effort:
Centralized Reporting: Imagine a single dashboard that shows your Instagram follower growth next to your website traffic from Google Analytics and your email sign-ups from Mailchimp. By connecting everything to Looker Studio, you can get a complete view of how your marketing efforts work together.
Custom Visualization: Looker Studio offers far more flexibility than Instagram's in-app tools. You can create custom charts, scorecards, and tables that are tailored to the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that matter most to your business. Track trends over time, compare post performance, and design a report that truly tells your story.
Automated & Sharable Reports: Once set up, your dashboard will automatically refresh with the latest data. No more endless exporting and copy-pasting. You can share a single link to a live report with your team, stakeholders, or clients, ensuring everyone is looking at the same up-to-date information.
The Big Hurdle: There's No Native Connector
Here’s the first and most important thing to know: Google does not offer a free, native connector for Instagram. It’s a common point of confusion for users. You can easily connect tools like Google Sheets, BigQuery, or Google Analytics, but you won't find an official "Instagram" connector in the data source gallery.
This is because Instagram (owned by Meta) and Google are separate ecosystems. To bridge this gap, you need to use a third-party service, often called a "partner connector." These tools are built specifically to pull data from platforms like the Instagram Graph API and channel it smoothly into Looker Studio.
Your Solution: Using Third-Party Connectors
Third-party connectors act as the essential bridge between your Instagram data and your Looker Studio report. They handle all the technical details of communicating with the Instagram API, cleaning the data, and making it available as a standard data source within Looker Studio.
Dozens of these tools exist, and most operate on a subscription model. Some of the most popular and reliable connectors for Instagram include:
Supermetrics
Windsor.ai
Dataslayer.ai
Power My Analytics
While they all accomplish the same core task, they can differ in price, data refresh rates, and the specific fields or metrics they pull. We recommend checking out the Looker Studio Partner Gallery to compare options based on your budget and needs.
Step-by-Step: Connecting Instagram Data to Looker Studio
The exact clicks might vary slightly depending on which connector you choose, but the general process is almost always the same. We'll walk through it below.
Step 1: Choose and Sign Up for a Connector
First, pick a connector. For this example, let's assume you've chosen Supermetrics or Windsor.ai, as they are popular choices. Head to their website and sign up for an account. Most offer a free trial, which is an excellent way to test the setup before committing to a paid plan.
Step 2: Authenticate Your Instagram Account
Once you've created an account with the connector service, you need to give it permission to access your Instagram data. This is a crucial step.
Inside the connector's web application, you'll find an option to add data sources.
Select "Instagram Insights" or "Instagram Business."
This will trigger a pop-up asking you to log in with Facebook. This is correct! Meta requires you to authenticate through the Facebook account that has admin access to the Instagram Business profile and the parent Facebook Page.
Follow the on-screen prompts to grant the necessary permissions. You must be linking an Instagram Business or Creator account, personal Instagram profiles cannot be connected via the official API.
When this step is complete, your chosen connector now has secure, read-only access to your Instagram performance data.
Step 3: Add the Connector in Looker Studio
Now, head over to Looker Studio to integrate your newly linked data source.
Open a new or existing Looker Studio report.
In the menu, go to Resource > Manage added data sources and click "ADD A DATA SOURCE."
In the search bar, type the name of the connector you signed up for (e.g., "Supermetrics").
Select the connector from the search results.
You'll likely need to click an "AUTHORIZE" button, which asks you to log into your Google account to confirm that you want to allow this connector to work with Looker Studio. You may also need to authorize access to your connector account (e.g., your Supermetrics login).
This tells Looker Studio to "trust" the connector and be ready to receive data from it.
Step 4: Configure Your Instagram Data Source
This is where you tell the connector exactly what data you want to pull into your report. After authorization, a configuration panel will appear inside Looker Studio. Here, you'll need to specify:
The Instagram Account: Choose the specific Instagram profile(s) you connected in Step 2.
The Data & Report Type: You might see options to select data by "Profile," "Posts," or "Stories." Pick what's relevant for the charts you want to build.
Select Your Metrics and Dimensions: This is the most important part.
Dimensions are the attributes of your data (the "what"). Examples include Date, Post Caption, Post Type (Image, Video, Carousel), or Audience Country.
Metrics are the quantitative measurements (the "how many"). Examples include Impressions, Reach, Likes, Comments, and Follower Count.
Once you've selected your desired fields, find and click the "CONNECT" or "ADD" button, usually located in the top-right corner. Looker Studio will then show a final prompt to confirm. Click "ADD TO REPORT," and you're done! Your Instagram data is now available to use in any chart or table within that report.
What Should You Actually Track in Your Dashboard?
Connecting the data is just the first part. Building a useful report means focusing on the right KPIs. Here are a few essential metrics to include in your Instagram dashboard.
Overall Account Health
Followers: A simple scorecard showing your current follower count.
Follower Growth: A time-series line chart showing the net new followers gained over time.
Profile Reach & Impressions: A line chart showing how many unique accounts you're reaching and the total number of impressions your profile and content receive.
Content Performance
Engagement Rate: This is a crucial metric. Many connectors will provide it pre-calculated. You can show an overall average in a scorecard and track it over time in a line chart.
Top Posts Table: Create a table that includes the Post Thumbnail, Post Caption, Likes, Comments, and Saves. This quickly shows you what content is resonating most with your audience.
Story Analytics
Story Reach & Impressions: See how many people are viewing your stories.
Tap-Forwards and Exits: High exit rates on a particular story frame might signal that the content isn't hitting the mark. A table can help you identify these patterns.
Final Thoughts
While Instagram lacks a direct link to Looker Studio, third-party connectors provide a reliable and powerful bridge. By setting one up, you can automate your performance reporting, combine Instagram data with your other marketing analytics, and build custom dashboards that highlight the metrics that drive your business forward.
Instead of wrestling with connectors and building reports piece by piece, we built Graphed to handle the entire process for you. You can connect your Instagram account and dozens of other marketing platforms. Graphed helps marketing and sales teams create dashboards and reports more efficiently with natural language. Simply ask "Show me a comparison of Instagram reach versus website traffic for the last 90 days," and Graphed instantly builds a live, interactive dashboard - no more searching for the right API connector or dragging-and-dropping fields.