How to View Instagram Metrics
Thinking your Instagram content is performing well is one thing, but knowing for sure is another. The only way to truly understand what's resonating with your audience and driving growth is to look at the data. This guide walks you through exactly how to find, understand, and use your Instagram metrics to build a smarter, more effective content strategy.
First Things First: You Need a Professional Account
Before you can see any detailed analytics, Instagram requires you to have either a Creator or Business account. If you’re still using a personal account, you’re missing out on a treasure trove of valuable data. Don't worry, switching is free and only takes a minute.
Here’s how to make the change:
Go to your Instagram profile and tap the three horizontal lines (the "hamburger menu") in the top-right corner.
Tap on Settings and privacy.
Scroll down and select Account type and tools.
Tap Switch to professional account.
Follow the on-screen prompts. You’ll be asked to choose a category that best describes what you do (e.g., Blogger, Artist, Digital Creator, Health/Beauty).
Finally, you'll choose between a Creator or Business account. For most individuals, influencers, and content creators, 'Creator' is the best fit. For brands, retailers, and service providers, 'Business' is ideal.
Once you've switched, the powerful analytics tools we're about to discuss will be unlocked for you.
How to Access Your Instagram Insights
With your professional account set up, a gateway to your data will appear right on your profile. This is your "Professional Dashboard," and it’s your new best friend.
To view your metrics:
Navigate to your main profile page.
Under your bio, you'll see a button that says Professional Dashboard. Tap it.
You are now in the main hub for all your professional tools and insights. Under the "Your Tools" section, tap on Account insights to see your performance analytics.
Here, Instagram breaks down your data for a selected timeframe, which you can adjust at the top of the screen (typically defaulted to the last 30 days).
The Key Instagram Metrics, Explained
Your Insights dashboard can feel a bit overwhelming at first glance. Let's break down the most important metrics you'll find there and what they actually mean for your strategy.
1. The High-Level Overview
At the top of your Insights, you’ll see three key performance indicators that give you a bird's-eye view of your account's health.
Accounts Reached: This is the total number of unique Instagram accounts that have seen any of your content at least once. Think of this as the size of your audience over the selected period. Growing this number means you're successfully getting your content in front of new eyes.
Accounts Engaged: This is the total number of unique accounts that have interacted with your content. An interaction includes likes, comments, saves, shares, and even replies to stories. This metric helps you understand not just who sees your content, but who finds it interesting enough to act on.
Total Followers: This shows your current follower count along with the net change (the number of unfollows subtracted from follows) over the period. You can tap into this to see a more detailed breakdown of follower growth, locations, age, and gender.
2. Content-Specific Metrics
This is where you can analyze the performance of individual pieces of content. Instagram provides specific analytics for your posts, Stories, and Reels.
Metrics for Feed Posts (Photos, Carousels & In-Feed Videos)
To see analytics for a specific post, navigate to it from your profile and tap the View insights button below the image.
Reach vs. Impressions: This is a fundamental concept to grasp. Reach is the number of unique accounts who saw the post. Impressions is the total number of times the post was seen. If your impressions are higher than your reach, it's a good sign, it means people are viewing your post more than once.
Engagement (Likes, Comments, Shares, Saves): These are your classic engagement metrics.
Likes are a simple nod of appreciation.
Comments indicate a deeper level of engagement and conversation.
Shares (sending via DM or adding to a story) show that your content is valuable enough to pass along.
Saves are a powerful signal to the algorithm. When someone saves your post, they're bookmarking it for later. This tells Instagram your content provides high value, which can boost its visibility. Pay close attention to which posts get the most saves!
Profile Activity: This group of metrics shows the actions people took after seeing your post. It includes things like Profile Visits, Follows, and taps on your Website Link. It directly connects content performance to account growth goals.
Metrics for Instagram Stories
You can view Story insights by opening your current Story and swiping up, or by going to your Content Insights and filtering for Stories. Stories offer unique metrics tied to their temporary, interactive format.
Navigation Metrics:
Taps Forward: The number of times someone tapped to skip to the next part of your story. A high number could mean your story wasn't engaging enough.
Taps Back: The number of taps to re-watch the previous part of your story. This is a great signal that your content was compelling or that viewers wanted a second look!
Next Story (Swipes Away): The number of swipes to move on to the next account’s Story. This is a key metric for understanding where in your Story sequence you lost viewers' attention.
Exited: The number of times someone swiped out of Stories altogether after viewing yours.
Interactions: This shows how many Replies and Shares your Story received. It also aggregates any engagement from stickers, like votes on a poll or answers in a quiz.
Metrics for Reels
Reels are critical for growth, and their metrics reflect what the algorithm values most: keeping people on the platform.
Views (or Plays): This is the number of times your Reel has started to play. Note: this counts replays as well.
Reach: As with posts, this is the number of unique accounts your Reel was shown to. A Reel going "viral" will have a reach significantly larger than your follower count.
Initial Plays vs. Replays: While not a single metric, if your total plays are much higher than your initial plays, it means people are watching your Reel over again. This is a huge positive signal to the algorithm.
Average Watch Time: An indicator of how long, on average, people watch your Reel. The longer people watch, the more likely Instagram is to show it to a wider audience. Capturing attention in the first 2-3 seconds is crucial here.
Engagement (Likes, Comments, Shares, Saves): These work just like they do for feed posts. For Reels, saves and shares are particularly potent indicators that your content should be pushed to a wider audience.
3. Understanding Your Audience Demographics
Knowing who is following you is just as important as knowing what content they like. From the main Insights dashboard, tap into Total Followers to get a full demographic report.
Top Locations: See the top cities and countries your followers reside in. This is invaluable for local businesses or brands targeting specific regions.
Age Range & Gender: Understand the general makeup of your audience to ensure your content, language, and tone align with who you're speaking to.
Most Active Times: This is pure gold. This chart shows you the precise days and hours your followers are most active on Instagram. Use this data to schedule your most important posts for maximum initial visibility and engagement.
How to Use These Metrics to Grow Your Account
Data is useless without action. Here is how to turn these numbers into a practical, growth-oriented strategy.
Identify Your Top-Performing Content: Go to your Content Insights and filter by different metrics like Reach, Saves, or Comments over the past 3 months. What patterns do you see? Do carousel posts get more saves? Do Reels with a certain audio trend get more shares? Find what works and create more of it.
Post When Your Audience is Online: Stop guessing the best time to post. Check your "Most Active Times" in your Audience insights and schedule your content to drop during peak hours. This gives your content the best chance to get that critical initial traction.
Double Down on What Drives Profile Visits: If a specific type of post or Reel caption is consistently driving people to visit your profile, that's your hook. Refine that approach to convert more of those visitors into followers.
Optimize Your Stories: Analyze your Story navigation metrics. If you see a large drop-off (swipes away) after the second slide, maybe your introductions are too long or the content isn’t engaging enough. Use this feedback to create tighter, more compelling Story sequences.
Final Thoughts
Checking your Instagram Insights regularly is the fastest way to move from guessing what to post to building a data-driven strategy. By understanding which content resonates, who your audience is, and when they're active, you can create more of what your followers love and accelerate your growth.
Once you get comfortable tracking metrics on a single platform like Instagram, you’ll naturally want to connect those efforts to a bigger picture. For example, how does your Instagram traffic impact your Shopify sales or influence sign-ups tracked in Google Analytics? That's where connecting your platforms becomes essential. Looking at each one individually is time-consuming, but tools like Graphed are built to solve this. At Graphed, we make it easy to link all your marketing and sales data sources into one place. From there, you can just ask in plain English for the report you need, and a dashboard is instantly created, giving you back hours of manual reporting work.