Are you ready to leave Instagram yet?
If so, you’ll probably want to download an archive of your account, including the photos and videos you’ve uploaded to the service, any archived Stories, comments on your posts, instant messages and other data before closing your Instagram account permanently.
You’ll receive a download link via email. Download and unpack your archive and you’ll be able to freely browse all of the media you’ve shared, your Stories and a bunch of other items.
If you’ve ever requested an archive of your Facebook account, you’ll feel right at home.
1) Using your web browser, navigate to instagram.com/download/request.
TIP: Alternatively, log in at instagram.com, then click your profile image in the upper-right corner. Click the cog icon next to your user name, then choose Privacy & Security from the list. Finally, click the link Request Download underneath the headline Data Download.
2) Type the email address where you’d like to receive your download link, then click Next.
3) Enter your Instagram password, then click Request Download.
NOTE: Instagram can only work on one request from your account at a time.
You’ll see a message confirming Instagram is busy creating a file of things you’ve shared on the service. The system will send your download link to the email address you provided. Instagram notes that it may take up to 48 hours to prepare and collect your account data and create a downloadable archive so keep that in mind.
4) Check your inbox for any messages from Instagram regarding your download link. Upon receiving Instagram’s email, click the link Download Data at the bottom of the message.
5) You should land on a confirmation webpage. Click Download Data to proceed.
TIP: Your download link will only work for the next four days.
6) After your browser has finished downloading the file, open your Downloads folder or whichever custom folder you’ve designated as your destination for web downloads.
7) You’ll see a ZIP file with your user name in the title. Open it to unpack the archive.
8) Open the folder containing your unpacked Instagram account data.
You’re advised to download your Instagram account data and media on a regular basis and back it up to Time Machine, an external disk, a USB thumb drive, iCloud Drive or a third-party cloud storage service like Dropbox, Google Drive, Box or OneDrive.
Your comments, likes and connections, uploaded contacts, the usernames of your followers and people you follow, the text of your instant messages, your profile information, searches you’ve conducted on Instagram, your post and Story captions, account settings, media meta data and other non-media items are stored in their separate JSON files.
Simply open a .JSON file in your text editor to access and analyze its underlying contents.
It’s also a good idea to keep your download link private because it may contain personal information.
You should only download the archive to your own computer.