How can I embed an Instagram post on my website?
By Zyff
Short answer
Open the post on instagram.com in a browser, click the '…' menu above it and choose Embed, then copy the code it gives you and paste it into your page. This is Instagram's own feature, it is free, and it needs no account of your own — but it works for one post at a time.
The Embed option only appears on the web version and only for public accounts. It is missing in the mobile app, which is where most people look for it first.
Getting the code
The route is short but easy to miss because the app does not offer it.
- Open instagram.com in a desktop browser and find the post.
- Click the '…' above the post, or on the post's own page.
- Choose Embed. A dialog appears with the code and a checkbox for including the caption.
- Copy the code and paste it wherever your site accepts HTML.
What you actually get
A blockquote plus Instagram's embed script, which the script then replaces with an iframe rendering the post in Instagram's styling. Reels work the same way and play in place.
Two things follow from it being an iframe. It will not inherit your fonts or colours, and it loads Instagram's script — which is not small — on every page you put it on. For one post that is a fair trade; for twelve, it is not.
When a feed widget is the better answer
Instagram's embed is right for quoting a specific post: a launch announcement, a customer's photo of your product, a reel you want on a landing page. It is the wrong tool for a gallery, because it is per-post, manual, and every embed you add is another copy of the same heavy script.
It is also static. The post you embedded is the post that shows, for as long as it exists — which is what you want for a quote and not what you want for a feed that should stay current. A feed widget shows your latest posts without you touching the page again.
What happens when the post is deleted
The embed empties. The same is true if the account is switched to private or the post is archived — the block on your page becomes blank space, silently, with nothing in the page source to explain it.
This is a good reason not to build a page's layout around an embedded post. Put it inside a section that still reads sensibly if the post vanishes.
Instagram Feed Widget
Show posts, reels and hashtags from Instagram on your site.
Also asked
- How do I embed a single Instagram photo?
- Can I embed an Instagram reel?
All of these have the same answer, so they share this page rather than each getting a near-identical one of their own.