instagrapi

⚠️ Telegram support group moved to aiograpi_support — the previous @instagrapi group has been restricted by Meta and is no longer maintained.

Fast and effective unofficial Instagram API wrapper for Python.

instagrapi combines public web and private mobile API flows, supports session persistence and challenge handling, and covers the main automation primitives for users, media, stories, direct messages, notes, locations, comments, insights, and uploads.

Private API automation is fragile in production because account trust, proxies, device state, challenges, and rate limits can change independently of the library. For account-owned business workflows, prefer official Instagram APIs where they cover your use case. For production private API infrastructure, a hosted provider such as HikerAPI may be a better fit than maintaining accounts, proxies, and challenge handling yourself.

The instagrapi project is best suited for testing, research, and controlled internal automation.

✨ aiograpi - Asynchronous Python library for Instagram Private API ✨

Support Python 3.10+

Python 3.9 support was dropped in 2.5.0. Upstream security patches for Pillow 12.x and pytest 9.x are not backported to Python 3.9, leaving conditional pins permanently exposed to known CVEs. Users who need Python 3.9 should pin to instagrapi==2.4.5.

Installation

pip install instagrapi

Optional public web TLS impersonation support is available as an extra:

pip install "instagrapi[curl]"

Use it only for public web endpoints that are sensitive to browser TLS fingerprints:

cl = Client(public_transport="curl", public_transport_impersonate="chrome136")

See the public transport guide for live comparison results and caveats.

TLS certificate verification is enabled by default. For a trusted debugging MITM proxy, prefer Client(tls_verify="/path/to/proxy-ca.pem"); use Client(tls_verify=False) only for temporary local debugging because it allows session interception.

If your project uses uv, you can add the package with:

uv add instagrapi

Or install it into the active virtual environment:

uv pip install instagrapi

Video uploads can use a built-in MP4 metadata parser when you provide thumbnail=.... Automatic thumbnail generation, StoryBuilder, and video/audio composition still need the optional video dependencies, MoviePy 2.2.1, and executable ffmpeg:

pip install "instagrapi[video]"
pip install --no-deps "moviepy==2.2.1"

MoviePy 2.2.1 currently declares Pillow<12, but instagrapi keeps Pillow>=12.2.0 for security fixes; the --no-deps install keeps the safe Pillow version. If your project imports MoviePy directly, migrate any MoviePy 1.x code from moviepy.editor, set_*, resize, and subclip APIs to the MoviePy 2.x API before upgrading.

Android users should see Pydroid and ffmpeg and Termux.

Quick Start

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(ACCOUNT_USERNAME, ACCOUNT_PASSWORD)

user_id = cl.user_id_from_username(ACCOUNT_USERNAME)
medias = cl.user_medias(user_id, 20)

Runnable Examples

Practical scripts live in examples/README.md. They cover session login, public lookups, media downloads, feed uploads, Reels and Trial Reels, story uploads, Direct messages, proxies, challenge handling, and optional curl-backed public transport.

Session Persistence

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)
cl.dump_settings("session.json")

# reload later without entering credentials again
cl = Client()
cl.load_settings("session.json")
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)

If you want more explicit control over the loaded session object:

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.set_settings(cl.load_settings("session.json"))
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)

Login using a sessionid

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login_by_sessionid("<your_sessionid>")

login_by_sessionid() is best treated as a lightweight compatibility path. For long-lived automation, prefer the normal login() -> dump_settings() -> load_settings()/set_settings() session flow.

If a browser/web sessionid returns login_required or logs the browser out, Instagram rejected that session for the private mobile API. Use a stable password login once, save settings with dump_settings(), and reuse those settings instead of repeatedly importing browser cookies.

Typical Tasks

List and download another user's posts

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)

target_id = cl.user_id_from_username("target_user")
posts = cl.user_medias(target_id, amount=10)
for media in posts:
    # download photos to the current folder
    cl.photo_download(media.pk)

See examples/session_login.py for a standalone script demonstrating these login methods.

Search locations by name or exact pk

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)

places = cl.location_search_name("Times Square")
place = places[0]
same_place = cl.location_search_pk(place.pk)

print(same_place.name, same_place.pk)

Send and read Direct messages

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)

target_id = cl.user_id_from_username("target_user")
sent = cl.direct_send("Hello from instagrapi", user_ids=[target_id])
print("sent", sent.id)

threads = cl.direct_threads(amount=5)
for thread in threads:
    last_message = thread.messages[0] if thread.messages else None
    print(thread.id, thread.thread_title, last_message.text if last_message else "")

Work with Direct messages over Realtime MQTT

Realtime MQTT support is experimental. It opens Instagram's private MQTToT connection after login, emits live callbacks, and uses the same Client.proxy settings as HTTP requests. The realtime client can receive Direct message sync events and publish lightweight Direct actions such as text, reactions, typing, and seen state. Use the regular direct_* methods for media sends and full thread management.

import json

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)


def handle_direct_message(payload):
    print(json.dumps(payload, indent=2, ensure_ascii=False))


cl.realtime_on("message", handle_direct_message)

rt = cl.realtime_connect()
rt.direct_subscribe()

try:
    rt.ping()
    rt.direct_send_text(THREAD_ID, "Hello from MQTT")
    while True:
        rt.read_once()
finally:
    cl.realtime_disconnect()

See the full Realtime MQTT guide for lower-level subscriptions and event details.

Receive Direct push notifications over FBNS

FBNS uses Instagram's separate push MQTT connection and registers an Android push token for the logged-in session. It is useful when you need push payloads such as Direct notification callbacks.

import json

from instagrapi import Client

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD)


def handle_push(payload):
    print(json.dumps(payload, indent=2, ensure_ascii=False))


cl.fbns_on("push", handle_push)
fbns = cl.fbns_connect()

try:
    fbns.ping()
    while True:
        cl.fbns_read_once()
finally:
    cl.fbns_disconnect()

Features

• Uses Web API and Mobile API flows where available
• Supports login by password, 2FA, 8-digit backup codes, sessionid, and Bloks 2FA fallback/helpers for newer verification flows
• Includes email/SMS-based challenge resolver hooks
• Uploads and downloads photos, videos, albums, IGTV, reels, and stories
• Works with users, media, comments, locations, hashtags, collections, notes, direct messages, and insights
• Exposes account notification setting helpers with typed notification categories
• Supports story building with mentions, hashtags, link stickers, and media stickers
• Includes helpers for current location search and Direct message workflows
• Supports mobile follower sorting with date_followed_latest and date_followed_earliest
• App-side discovery surfaces: chaining, fetch_suggestion_details, discover_recommended_accounts_for_category_v1, user_stream_*, user_web_profile_info_v1
• v2 search SERPs: media_search, fbsearch_accounts_v2, fbsearch_reels_v2, fbsearch_topsearch_v2, fbsearch_typehead
• Alternative media-info path (media_info_v2) for ad-tagged / sponsored media that the canonical endpoint refuses
• Experimental Realtime MQTT helpers for live events, Direct message sync, lightweight Direct actions, and FBNS push callbacks

Anonymous/public web paths are best treated as opportunistic rather than guaranteed. Instagram can change or restrict them independently of the library, so production-grade workflows should prefer authenticated sessions.

Documentation And Support

API reference and full usage guide live at subzeroid.github.io/instagrapi:

• Documentation index
• Getting Started
• Usage Guide
• Interactions reference
• Best Practices for sessions, proxies, and anti-abuse handling
• Handle Exceptions for centralizing 429, challenge, and relogin logic
• GitHub Discussions
• Support chat in Telegram: aiograpi_support — the previous @instagrapi group was restricted by Meta and is no longer maintained

For other languages, consider instagrapi-rest. For async Python, see aiograpi.

Tutorials

Hands-on guides for real instagrapi work — login flows, sessions, proxies, scraping, posting, error handling — live at instagrapi.com/guides:

• Instagram Private API in Python — pillar walkthrough: login, sessions, fetching, posting
• 2FA and challenge_required
• Session persistence: file, Redis, and Postgres patterns
• Configuring proxies (HTTP, SOCKS5, residential)
• Instagram scraper in Python: a working setup
• Upload a photo from Python
• Download Instagram stories
• Common errors reference — bad_password, challenge_required, login_required, please_wait_a_few_minutes, feedback_required, proxy_address_is_blocked
• BadPassword: correct password rejected by Instagram — proxy/IP/device/session trust troubleshooting
• Framework integrations — Django, FastAPI, Celery, Docker, AWS Lambda

Comparing instagrapi to other tools:

• instagrapi vs Instaloader — download-only vs authenticated automation
• instagrapi vs aiograpi — sync or async
• Instagram API libraries by language — what's actually maintained in 2026

Additional example

from instagrapi import Client
from instagrapi.types import StoryMention, StoryMedia, StoryLink, StoryHashtag

cl = Client()
cl.login(USERNAME, PASSWORD, verification_code="<2FA CODE HERE>")

media_pk = cl.media_pk_from_url('https://www.instagram.com/p/CGgDsi7JQdS/')
media_path = cl.video_download(media_pk)
subzeroid = cl.user_info_by_username('subzeroid')
hashtag = cl.hashtag_info('dhbastards')

cl.video_upload_to_story(
    media_path,
    "Credits @subzeroid",
    mentions=[StoryMention(user=subzeroid, x=0.49892962, y=0.703125, width=0.8333333333333334, height=0.125)],
    links=[StoryLink(webUri='https://github.com/subzeroid/instagrapi')],
    hashtags=[StoryHashtag(hashtag=hashtag, x=0.23, y=0.32, width=0.5, height=0.22)],
    medias=[StoryMedia(media_pk=media_pk, x=0.5, y=0.5, width=0.6, height=0.8)]
)

Related Projects

If you need async Python, use [aiograpi](https://github.com/sub