Connecting your Instagram business account to Buffer

Buffer supports Instagram business accounts. If you’re unsure which type of Instagram account you have, please see here. Whilst connecting your Instagram account should only take a few minutes, it's not uncommon to run into permissions issues with Instagram and/or Facebook, so we recommend following these steps carefully.

This article contains the following sections:

1. Video walkthrough
2. Connecting your Instagram business account
3. Setting up Instagram reminders

Video walkthrough

In the video below, Katie, from our Customer Advocacy team, will walk you through the steps to help you get your Instagram Business account up and running as smoothly as possible.

Connecting your Instagram business account

1. If you haven’t already, you’ll need to convert your Instagram personal profile to a business account, following the steps here.

2. In Buffer, click on your profile avatar at the top right of your dashboard and then click Account from the drop down menu.

3. Click the Channels option from the menu on the left hand side of your screen.

4. Click Instagram. (If you already have channels connected, click Connect New Channel and then click Instagram.)

   

5. Click Authenticate with Facebook. It is required that Instagram business accounts be linked to a Facebook Page in order to connect them to Buffer. This is why the authentication process needs to be completed within Facebook.

6. Enter your Facebook login credentials and click Login. If you're already signed into Facebook, you will just need to enter your password and click Continue.

   ✏️ It is required to login to the personal Facebook profile that has the admin role on the Facebook Page connected to your Instagram account. If you log into a Facebook profile that does not have the admin role on the Page, or if your profile isn't correctly setup as an admin within Facebook Business Suite, you will not see your Instagram business account listed in the next step. Learn how to find your Page role here.

   

7. You'll need to authorize Buffer to access your Facebook account. Click Continue as [name] and then click OK on the next prompt. (You won't see these steps if you already have another Facebook or Instagram account connected to Buffer that was authorized through the same Facebook personal profile. Instead, you'll see a message asking to continue with previous settings. Do not make changes here and just click Continue as [your profile name].)

   ✏️ You'll notice here an option to "Choose what you allow". This option is required to be shown in this step due to Facebook's guidelines, but modifying any of the permissions here will mean that we are not able to authenticate with Facebook and it will not be possible to connect your Instagram account.

   

8. Click on the Instagram channel you'd like to connect and click Add to Buffer.

   ⚠️ Not seeing your Instagram account listed? Please see the troubleshooting guide here.

Setting up Instagram reminders

Instagram works a bit differently than other social networks and not all posts can be published automatically. Posts containing multiple images, or containing an image or video that falls outside of Instagram's accepted aspect ratio range, will be scheduled as reminders. Whenever you're scheduling a post, we'll let you know if it's going to be scheduled as a reminder. You can learn more about reminders here.

The first time you schedule a post that will be sent as a reminder, you’ll be prompted to set up reminders if you don’t already have the mobile app installed. You don’t need to complete these steps unless you’re prompted to do so in the app.

1. Click Set Up Reminders (either in the prompt at the top of the queue or on a post that is scheduled as a reminder).

   

2. Download the Buffer mobile app, either on iOS or Android and then sign into your account. Push notifications should be enabled automatically when you sign into your account on the mobile app.

3. Click I’ve enabled Push Notifications.

   

4. Click Go to dashboard.