Instagram metrics
Instagram metrics, explained
What every number in your Instagram insights actually counts, whether you want it higher or lower, and where to find it. Written from the metrics Instagram really serves — not from a list of the ones it used to.
Who saw it
How many people Instagram showed your content to, and how many times.
Reach
Reach is the number of unique accounts that saw your post, reel or story at least once — people, not views, so one person watching three times counts once.
Higher is betterViews
Views count the number of times your post, reel or story was played or displayed, including repeat views by the same person.
Higher is betterImpressions
Impressions — the number of times a post was shown — is no longer reported: Meta deprecated it in April 2025 and replaced it with views.
No longer reported
What they did
The actions on the post itself — and the rate that turns them into something comparable.
Engagement rate
Engagement rate is a post's interactions divided by an audience size — and it should be reach, the people who actually saw the post, not your follower count.
Higher is betterInteractions
Interactions is Instagram's total of the actions taken on a post — likes, comments, saves and shares added together into one count.
Higher is betterSaves
Saves is the number of times people bookmarked your post or reel to their saved collection — an intention to come back to it.
Higher is betterShares
Shares is the number of times your post, reel or story was sent on by someone — to a friend in a message, or onto their own story.
Higher is better
Where they went next
What people did after the post. The signals only the account holder can see.
Profile visits
Profile visits is the number of times people went to your profile from a post or story — the step between liking something and following you.
Higher is betterLink taps
Link taps is the number of times people tapped a link on your Instagram profile — the closest Instagram comes to measuring traffic you sent somewhere.
Higher is betterFollows
Follows is the number of accounts that started following you from a particular post or story — the post-level answer to "what is growing my account?"
Higher is better
Reels
The metrics Instagram serves for reels and nothing else.
Skip rate
Skip rate is the percentage of viewers who moved on from your reel early rather than staying with it — lower means your opening held people.
Lower is betterAverage watch time
Average watch time is how long, on average, a viewer spent watching your reel — the total time watched divided across the people who watched.
Higher is better
Stories
Story insights last twenty-four hours in the API, and one line on the screen is four behaviours added together.
Story navigation
Navigation is the total number of times viewers moved through your story — tapping forward, swiping to the next account, tapping back, or exiting — added into one number.
It dependsForward vs next story
Forward means a viewer tapped through to your next frame; next story means they swiped away to another account's story — one is watching, the other is leaving you.
It dependsBack
Back is the number of times viewers tapped to return to the previous frame of your story — they wanted to see it again.
Higher is betterStory exits
Exits is the number of times a viewer closed stories altogether while on your story — not moving on to the next frame or account, but stopping.
Lower is better
Stop reading your insights one post at a time
Connect an Instagram professional account and Pullsy records your insights every day and keeps them — including story insights, which Instagram's API drops after 24 hours.