Inssist F.A.Q. & Support

Inssist stands for Instagram Assistant. It is a powerful Chrome Extension (plugin) and a standalone app that brings Instagram Mobile View to your desktop.

It allows posting photos, videos and stories, managing comments and sending DMs as if you were using a mobile version of Instagram web app, plus scheduling content, finding relevant hashtags and much more.

Bloggers, photographers, marketing specialists, business owners use Inssist to save time and improve their Instagram workflow.

Why use Inssist?

• Inssist saves time, brings critical Instagram features to the Desktop, ensures the best image and video quality and adds extra capabilities such as bulk scheduling.
• You no longer need to transfer photos or videos back and forth between the PC and Mobile Device to post them.
• It is much more convenient to send Direct Messages from the Desktop app rather than type them on Mobile.
• Inssist is the only extension that can post and schedule Videos, including Stories and Reels.
• Photos posted with Inssist have a better end quality when compared to posting from Android devices due to optimized compression algorithm.

Inssist is distributed through the official Chrome Web Store. To get Inssist to your browser, please navigate to Inssist Plugin Page and click the “Add to Chrome” button.

All Chromium based browsers are supported: Chrome, Chromium, Brave, Vivaldi, Opera, Microsoft Edge etc.

Once installed, clicked the Inssist icon in the Chrome Toolbar and then login to Instagram. If you’re already logged in to Instagram in your browser, Inssist will pick up your session automatically.

Now you can start posting to your Instagram account from Desktop, scheduling posts, stories and reels. customizing your Instagram profile and much more.

How to switch Instagram account in Inssist?

Please open the Instagram home page in your browser, log out and log back in under a different Instagram @username. Inssist will understand that the accounts was changed and pick it up automatically.

Alternatively, please locate the Multiaccount Switch at the top right of your screen, hover over it and then click “Add Account” button.

After you connect a second Instagram account to Inssist, you will be able to switch between them with a single click.

How many Instagram accounts can I use with Inssist?

Unlimited. We do not limit a number of Instagram accounts you can use with Inssist.

We do not recommend running more than 5 from the same IP address though. If you run more, there is a slight chance the IP address will be rate limited for liking, posting or commenting by Instagram.

How do I remove Inssist from my Chrome?

Please navigate to chrome://extensions link in browser, locate Inssist and click Remove button.

If you had a PRO subscription, you can cancel it from the Billing Website. Please enter your email address to log into FastSpring. You can also cancel your subscription from the app by locating the PRO Tab and clicking Manage Account button.

Can I use Inssist on Mobile?

We do not currently have plans to release a mobile version of our app. You can get Inssist as a standalone app for MacOS / Windows / Linux from the homepage.

Inssist supports two ways of posting content to Instagram

• Direct Posting through Instagram API,
  which works for Photo posts, Video posts, Stories and Reels.
• Scheduled Posting through Post Later,
  which works for posting and scheduling Photo posts, Video posts, Carousels, Stories and Reels.

Direct posting to Instagram

Through direct posting, you can share Photos on your home feed, as well as Stories, Video Posts, Video Stories, and even Instagram Reels. To post directly on Instagram, simply find and click the button within the Instagram frame.

Then select a type of post you’d like to publish and upload content such as photos or videos. You can specify caption, location, hashtags, mentions and other parameters for your posts.

You can also upload a video cover (thumbnail) for your video post or select a video frame as a cover to make sure your Instagram grid looks perfect and consistent.

Please note that you will be directed to Post Later when selecting Carousel or Schedule.

Scheduled posting to Instagram

Scheduled posting to Instagram works through Post Later that can post and schedule Photos, Videos, Carousels (multi-media posts), Stories and Reels.

Head over to the Post Later section in the left sidebar and either click "ADD FILES" or simply drag and drop your file(s) to create a new post, story or reel:

To create a carousel post (multi-media post), click "ADD FILES" and select multiple files from your PC/Mac (or drag and drop them), and then click the "SINGLE POST" button. Inssist will set up the carousel post for you.

You can include up to 10 photo or video files in a single carousel.

Almost there! Write a caption and add hashtags. Then, simply click "PUBLISH NOW" to upload your carousel post immediately, or choose "SCHEDULE" to post it at a specific time.

To upload up to 10 stories or reels simultaneously, also make use of the bulk upload feature in Post Later. Just choose the type of content: Reel or Story.

Recommended media file sizes

Inssist applies a photo and video compression algorithm that ensures the best quality possible with a minimum pixelization.

It is advised to use one of suggested media file formats to ensure the best quality. Here’s a list of the Instagram media file formats along with the optimal sizes:

How to resize, cut or format media files before upload?

For videos it is important to have the file converted to either MP4-h264 or WEBM. Instagram rejects video files in other formats. Here is a list of free online tools available that can help you resize and reformat your files:

• Zamzar (recommended) and CloudCovert can convert your video format to MP4.
• Ezgif.com has tools that work both with photos and videos.
• OnlineConvert.com can convert and resize your media files for free.
• Photoshop and LightRoom are excellent for resizing and cutting photos.

Once your video size has been optimized for Instagram and a proper format is selected, upload it from the PC / Mac with Inssist with a few clicks.

Does Instagram retain photo resolution?

As long as your media file width is between 320 and 1080 pixels and aspect ratio is correct (see the table above), Instagram will keep the original resolution. If the aspect ratio isn’t supported, the photo or video will be automatically cropped.

Make sure to resize your image to a maximum width of 1080 pixels before you upload your image to avoid automatic resizing.

Due to limitation of the underlying Instagram Web API there are some things that Inssist can not do (yet):

• Mentions in Video Stories. Mentions on photo stories are supported though.
• Adding GIFs, Music, Location and Hashtag stickers to Stories. All these features are sadly not yet available on the Instagram Web API.
• An official Instagram Mobile App should be used to work with Highlights and Saved Collections or DM-ing videos. These features are not available on the web.

When Stories Music and other features will be added?

Inssist depends on Instagram Web API to function. Since we always monitor the platform for new cool things the new features are added to the product as soon as they become available on the Instagram Web API. However, you still can add music or upload your tracks.

To repost any photo or video to your home feed, hover over the post in Inssist Instagram view and click the Repost button (the second one in the list).

Inssist will automatically @attribute the post author in the caption. It is a good idea to ask for an author’s permission before reposting since you are responsible for your actions on the platform.

You can also re-schedule any posted post to your Instagram profile by clicking Repost and then Schedule Post button.

How to repost media to Pinterest?

You can repost any photo from Instagram to Pinterest in a few clicks by hovering over a post and clicking the Pin button, which is the 1st button on the post.

How to download media from Instagram?

You can download any media to your machine by hovering over a post in Inssist Instagram view and clicking Download button, which is the 3rd button on the post.

Post Later offers additional functionalities, including:

• Posting Calendar and Time Slots to plan ahead and schedule faster.
• Bulk scheduling with drag & drop support to upload and schedule multiple files at once.

Can I uploads posts from a CSV file?

Yes! You can schedule posts by dragging a CSV file over "ADD FILES" button. Make sure to use URLs for images in your post.

You can specify optional date and hour, caption and multiple images per post in your CSV file to create a carousel. And you do not need to provide a header either. Try to upload a sample CSV file.

How many posts can I schedule?

There is no limit on the number of posts that can be scheduled with Inssist PRO.

Do I have to have a Business account to schedule posts?

Nope. Post Later is in no way linked to Facebook, so a Facebook account is not required to schedule posts with delayed posting.

Inssist Tag Assistant module lets you search for and build an effective hashtag library. Follow these rules and tips to pick the best hashtags for your posts:

Always use hashtags that are relevant to your post.

Check for banned and flagged hashtags and avoid them.

Build a Hashtag Ladder: 8-10 of the hashtags on your post should have an engagement lower than you profile, 8-10 similar to yours, and 8-10 higher.

Rotate your hashtags often.

To search for hashtags, please navigate to the Tag Assistant Tab on the left:

There you can enter tags relevant to your Instagram content. Inssist will suggest you hashtags that were found on top posts alongside the tags you search for and mark banned or flagged hashtags to avoid.

How do I find hashtag suggestions in my language?

You can switch between latin and non-latin characters in hashtag search results with the “globe” toggle button besides the search input box.

How do I manage hashtag collections?

Please switch to the Collections Tab in the Tag Assistant. You can create and manage your collections and reuse them in your posts later:

Inssist can scan your account periodically to find new followers and unfollowers. Analytics module can be located under the Analytics Tab on the left.

Use Analytics module to track who unfollowed you and engage with them to reduce followers churn. You can also welcome new followers, follow them back or like their posts with a click of a button:

You can run analytics manually from time to time or set up automatic analytics data collection: either daily or weekly. It is recommended to run analytics once a week when you are less likely to engage with Instagram on your Mobile device.

With account analytics you can quickly locate mutual or unilateral followers, download followers and unfollower lists for further analysis and engage (leave likes, follow / unfollow, send DMs) right from the analytics report.

How Inssist collects analytics data?

Inssist scans up to 10k of your followers and detects new and churning ones. It has to run the scan at least twice to show results. The scans are run locally and the data is never sent away from your machine.

Inssist respects Instagram request rate limits and the more followers you have the longer the check takes.

You can close Inssist tab while the check is running. Please make sure the Chrome is running and connected to the Internet for the scan to finish in background.

Insights module can collect information on when yours competitors post, what hashtags they use and what content brings them the most engagement:

Insights can scan followers and followings, calculate spambot percentage, find mutual followers and much more.

To create an Insight, please locate click the Analytics Tab on the left, scroll down and click ADD TASK button. Enter the @username to scan, number of followers and followings to scan. Skip scanning followers and followings if you do not need this information as it takes quite some time to perform followers scan.

Inssist will collect publicly available data on user’s followers, followings, posts, hashtags and posting times which then can be browsed or exported for inspection.

You can also engage with the followers by liking their posts from Insights panel or sending DMs.

How to download account followers?

To get followers of a public account, create an Inssist Insight and once the report is ready, click DOWNLOAD ALL button to get followers in JSON, CSV or TXT formats.

What is Account Grade?

Inssist can check any public Instagram account profile to find out if account is a spam or a real person or business. Whenever you navigate to any account with Inssist, it will show you their grade, from A — credible to F — likely spam.

The way Inssist detects spam followers is by looking into their avatar, bio, post times, followers and followings count, followers / followings ratio and other parameters and applies a set of weighted heuristic rules to score the account.

For example if a number of followings is around 7500 then it is a red flag since spammers tend to follow around 5000-7500 accounts. But it is usually a combination of multiple parameters such as a missing BIO or a low profile engagement to followers ratio that gives away a potentially spam account.

What is Engagement Rate?

Inssist can scan any public Instagram account profile to find out how active account followers are. The higher account engagement rate the better. A formula for engagement rate is:

[ likes + comments * 10 ] / followers_count

Likes and comments are counted on the recent 12 posts, with the most recent post excluded for precision.

How to find out if account has purchased followers?

You can scan followers of any public account with Inssist Insights module and then click Check followers for spam button to find a % percentage of spam followers.

Inssist will span some of the account followers selectively and interpolate results to determine the spam followers percentage.

If you see spambot percentage above 15-20% it is quite likely account has purchased followers. If you advertise your products through influencers, it might be a good idea to avoid purchasing ads from such accounts.

App introduces two features to Direct Messaging: Chat Filters and Ghost Mode.

Chat filters allow looking for chats by username and status: unread and flagged.

Ghost Mode allows peaking into chats without marking them as read and the message owner noticing you’ve read their messages. This is helpful in certain scenarios when you are not ready to reply yet or to filter spammers and buliers.

To locate Direct Messaging, please click the DM button in the side bar on the left.

Multiaccount feature allows connecting multiple Instagram accounts to Inssist and switching between them with a click of a button. Inssist will remember your session cookies locally and won’t ask you to re-enter password every time:

There is no limit as to how many Instagram accounts you can connect to Inssist.

To connect additional Instagram accounts to your Inssist application, please locate your avatar at the top right corner, hover your mouse over it and click the + plus button, then login to Instagram.

Inssist has free Dark and Zen Modes, both can be turned on and off from the right hand-side panel:

Buttons on the right also let you navigate back in Instagram frame, refresh the Instagram frame and switch to Fullscreen Mode.

PRO version is an optional paid upgrade. You can get a PRO license right from the Inssist plugin. Here is a comparison of PRO and Free versions of the plugin:

• Post Reels from Desktop.
• Schedule Posts with a help of time slots and preview them in a grid or calendar. Publish carousels and edit Video covers.
• Upload Custom Covers for your video posts.
• Swipe up (link sharing) for stories.

By upgrading you make our work of maintaining Inssist and developing new features possible. Thank you!

What are the payment plans?

We provide 3 distinct Inssist PRO plans: Monthly and Lifetime. They provide the same features.

• Monthly plan is charged a small fee each month and auto-renews every month until canceled. You can use an unlimited number of accounts with this plan.
• Lifetime plan is purchased once per Instagram account and stays active for that Instagram account as long as you’re signed in to Inssist with your email.

Monthly and Lifetime plans are intended for a single person or organization and should not be shared. We reserve a right to cancel a PRO plan if it is misused by being shared publicly or across multiple organizations.

Do you offer refunds?

Inssist is provided AS IS. We do not offer refunds, even if it shut down willingly or unwillingly. Please check out our Terms of Service for more info.

We aim to provide a free-to-try demo period for every paid feature so that you can preview them before making a purchase decision. We suggest making sure that Inssist FREE works for you before purchasing a PRO license.

I forgot my account password.

No problem! Please open the billing screen in Inssist, locate the RECOVER MY PURCHASES button, enter your email address and then click blue FORGOT PASSWORD button in the password input box.

Inssist will send a password recovery email to you from [email protected] email address.

I need an Invoice

You can download invoices from the Billing Management website.

If you’d like to have your company address on the invoice, please send us an email titled “Invoice Request” and include your company details.

Can I transfer my PRO license to another PC?

Sure. Simply log into your Inssist account on a new PC in Inssist app and you should get your PRO license active.

Something does not work? Most likely a solution to your problem is found below:

My PRO version is not recognized by the App?

Please navigate to the PRO Billing tab (the last button on the left) in the app and make sure you’re signed in to your Inssist account.

If you’re not signed in, locate the RECOVER MY PURCHASES button and sign back in.

If you do not see your PRO version after you sign in to Inssist account, that means the last transaction has failed. Our trusted payment processing gateway always sends an email if a transaction has failed with a reason of the failure. Most likely the card has expired or has insufficient funds. In such case it is best to cancel the subscription and resubscribe.

Please navigate to Account Management portal using your Inssist email address and check the status of your subscription.

I do not receive an email verification code?

Sometimes emails get lost in a spam box or not delivered because your email service provider rejects them. Inssist sends emails from [email protected] address and never spams.

If you are still not getting a verification code, please send us a message from your email address.

Google WebStore says this item has been disabled in Chrome?

This may happen due to a plugin conflict, during a Chrome version update or if you accidentally disabled the plugin in a Chrome Toolbar.

To enable Inssist, please open chrome://extensions link in Chrome, locate Inssist and click a switch to enable it back:

How to force an update to the latest version?

Chrome typically checks for new plugin version every 24 hours.

You can force an update to the latest version by going to the chrome://extensions link, enabling Developer Mode switch in the top right and clicking Update button.

Standalone versions (MacOS / Windows / Linux) update automatically once they are closed and reopened.

Scheduling Videos hang at 0 or 99.9%

Please navigate and try to upload video through the instagram.com to check if this is Inssist issue. If the video upload fails, you can attempt a couple of solutions to overcome this problem:

• Reduce video size if possible by converting it to WEBM format using zamzar.com.
• Make sure there are no non-latin characters in video metatags such as ü or á. Non-latin characters are known to break video transcoding on Facebook servers.

If your video successfully uploads on Instagram.com website and fails through Inssist, please send us an email.

I am getting security warnings from Instagram?

Instagram is known to send warnings if it detects simultaneous account usage from multiple devices.

Try not to run Instagram on Mobile App and Inssist at the same time, reduce the number of actions (likes, follows, posts) you take on Instagram if you are hit by password change requests and security warnings.

It also always a good idea to enable the 2-Factor-Authentication on your account. Find more info on Instagram account security in our Instagram Security Guide

I am being logged out automatically?

Please navigate to Facebook in your Chrome and remove all *.facebook.com cookies. Then navigate to Instagram and remove all *.instagram.com cookies, and relogin back to Facebook and Instagram.

This typically solves the issue. If not, please send us an email.

Doesn’t work while VPN is on?

Inssist needs to be able to make calls to Instagram.com website. Please make sure you can browse the Instagram website and post pages while your VPN is on.

Images are cut or videos do not upload?

For image and video aspect ratios supported by Instagram, please check one of these references: Inssist.com, Later.com or Tailwind.com

You can resize photos and videos to 1.91:1 — 9:16 aspect ratios with one of these free online tools:

• cloudconvert.com
• ezgif.com
• clideo.com

If a video does not upload, please ensure it is of one of supported formats & codecs, e.g. WEBM or MP4-h264. You can convert video format with these free tools:

• zamzar.com, recommended
• video.online-convert.com
• cloudconvert.com
• ezgif.com

Our guide on uploading videos can be found here.

Emojis do not render or show up as □ symbols!

Instagram.com and Inssist relies on Emojis built into your OS. There are know issues with rendering Emojis on Windows 7 for example.

If you have Windows 7 and Emojis do not render properly, try installing an update from Microsoft Support website.

How to activate Replies and Reactions in chat?

Instagram supports replies and reactions in DM chats but this feature may be hidden by default on Desktop. To activate a new version of the DM interface you will need a phone with the official Instagram Mobile App.

Launch Instagram and tap a Messaging / DM icon in the top-right corner of the app. Then open any chat.

Click (i) button at the top-right, click Theme and pick any theme. Once that is done, open that chat on your desktop/mac in Inssist and you will be able to reply to messages and leave emoji reactions on posts.

Inssist.com has refused to connect during checkout?

Please navigate to chrome://extensions page in your browser, locate Inssist, click Details button and make sure the *.inssist.com and *.onfastspring.com items are enabled under “Website access” section.

I found a bug!

🕸️ Help us smash️ it! Drop us an e-mail with the problem screenshot and / or explanation. We will jump right into solving it for you.

If possible please also attach a screenshot of the Console tab as it may contain some errors. You can open the console tab by right-clicking in Inssist page, selecting Inspect and then switching to Console tab at the top.

Our contact details are: [email protected]