When is the Best and Worst Time to Post on Instagram in 2023?

You may be a brand trying to make a presence on Instagram. You may also be a high school student trying to gain maximum likes and comments. Finding out the best time to post on Instagram is the ultimate deal.

Instagram’s algorithm keeps playing with the content that it shows to its users. Back in the days of the chronological feed, you could simply post at weekends or evenings by using a social media scheduler. Time was the first factor considered for posts to show up on top.

But, today, creating the most compelling content is necessary but not sufficient. It is equally important to finding just the right time to post the right content. Otherwise, your audience might never be able to see your content. 

Why best time to post on the Instagram matter?

When you know the correct time to upload your posts, you can make sense of the content overload. People will stop to see your posts when they are scrolling through their feeds. Whether you want to use the data to find out the peak times, or you want to take advantage of quieter hours – you can coordinate these insights to schedule Instagram posts, and prepare the best plans to use as an Instagram post scheduler. 

Are you searching for the universal best time to post on Instagram? We are sorry to inform you that there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Every industry is different, every brand is different, and so is the audience. However, you can use RecurPost to automate the process.

Our AI-based scheduling algorithm can automatically find the best time to post for your accounts. You should check us out instead of figuring out the best times manually.

The basic thing that you need to know to get more engagement is your audience’s behavior. The more you know about your audience, the better you’ll be able to cater to their content needs. And the more customized your content is, the higher engagement you will receive on your posts. Instagram offers the feature of insights that you can use to find out data about your audience’s behavior. 

We have studied different industries and categorized the optimal times to post on Instagram for all of them.

The Best Time to Post on Instagram by day:

• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Monday: 6 am, 10 am, and 10 pm EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Tuesday: 2 am, 4 am, and 9 am EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Wednesday: 7 am, 8 am, and 11 pm EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Thursday: 9 am, 12 pm, and 7 pm EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Friday: 5 am, 1 pm, and 3 pm EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Saturday: 11 am, 7 pm, and 8 pm EST
• Best Time To Post on Instagram on Sunday: 7 am, 8 am, and 4 pm EST

Instagram is the second biggest social media platform after Facebook. The daily logins are only expected to increase in the coming years. Looking at the platform as a whole the best time to post from Monday to Friday is from 9 AM to 4 PM. And the worst day of the week to post on Instagram is Sunday.

Also, try to post your content with the best Instagram Captions to gain more engagement!

Every day, from 4 PM to 6 PM, the engagement levels drop down comparatively. During the mornings, a bit of activity is noticed. Maybe because of the stories that are easy to check at any time. Thus, you should try to upload your posts and stories more in the morning hours.

Now let’s see different industries and the best time for them to post content on Instagram.

1. Best time to post on Instagram for technology industry

We recommend the following schedule for the technology industry.

Best days: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday

Worst days: Saturday and Sunday

Best time: 7 AM to 10 AM

Worst time: 12 PM

Mostly, tech companies think that they cannot grab much attention from people on social media. But, there are plenty of ways in which you can create compelling content. It could be in the form of BTS videos, employee stories, case studies, etc.

2. Best time to post on Instagram for education sector

Best days: Friday, Saturday

Best time: 9 AM to 8 PM

Worst days: Sunday and Monday

Worst time: Mornings up to 8 AM

To engage the people with your content, highlight activities that are undertaken at the institute, campus life, events, workshops, etc. During the night, a reasonable proportion of people stay online. You can experiment posting between 8 PM to 11 PM.

3. Best time to post on Instagram for media industry

Best days: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday

Best time: 8 AM to 4 PM

Worst days: Saturday and Sunday

Worst time: Mornings and nights

Media companies usually get engagement during odd hours. Thus, it is no harm in experimenting with your posting schedules. Fridays (9 AM to 5 PM) are the best days to post. Fridays are followed by Monday to Thursday from 8 AM to 4 PM.

4. Best time to post on Instagram for healthcare industry

Best days: Tuesday, Thursday

Best time: 7 AM to 7 PM

Worst days: Friday, Saturday and Sunday

The Healthcare industry has limited options with the kind of content it can show on social media. However, there is a scope of connecting with local authorities and providing people with education related to health issues. 

5. Best time to post on Instagram for finance sector

For the finance sector, research suggests the following schedule:

Best days: Wednesday, Friday

Best time: 10 AM to 4 PM

Worst days: Saturday, Sunday, Monday

At the first glance, financial sectors may not even consider growing a presence on social media. But, you can ideally use it to highlight events, customer feedbacks and stories, video content, and short articles. 

6. Best time to post on Instagram for non-profit sector

Best days: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday

Worst days: Saturday, Sunday

Best time: 9 AM to 8 PM

Worst time: Midnights and evenings

Social media platforms have been the hot favorite for non-profit organizations. These platforms can spread awareness and gain volunteers easily for contributing in their social work. Weekdays and afternoons make the best combination for building engagement in this case.

7. Best time to post on Instagram for consumer goods

Best days: Monday to Friday

Worst days: Sundays

Best time: 9 AM to 5 PM

Well, the visual nature of Instagram via zapier is the perfect fit to showcase and sell products of almost all kinds. A huge number of brands have already built their presence and are generating sales using influencer marketing, organic efforts, and paid ads.

8. Best time to post on Instagram for non-retail e-commerce

Best days: Monday to Friday

Worst days: Saturdays

Best time: 4 PM to 9 PM

The top non-retail e-commerce brands observe the highest engagement during nights and evenings, on all weekdays – majorly on Thursday. It’s because the audience is particularly interested in watching entertaining videos after work hours. Do you work in the non-retail e-commerce industry? Your work to manage your social media will begin after regular work hours. But, if you don’t wish to sit behind your desks all the time just to post, use the social media bulk scheduling feature of a tool. Just schedule your content beforehand to go out at the best time to post on Instagram.

Point to note: You might have thought that weekends are the best days to post content on Instagram. It makes sense as everybody is free from work. But, from the above research, it is quite clear that weekdays are better to post, especially for brands. On weekends, people generally post their own pictures or scroll through content that is entertaining; for example, memes. 

How to find your best time to post on Instagram

The above timings are the best times to post on Instagram on average. However, we think that if you want to gain more engagement you can do better.

It’ll be great if you find your customized best time on the basis of your unique audience. According to the Instagram algorithm, timeliness has always been a crucial factor. But ever since Instagram updated the algorithm, when you post has become more important than ever.

Therefore, if you want to conquer the Instagram algorithm, you must optimize your posting time. You will need to figure out when most of your audience is online. Instagram is now prioritizing both new and relevant content on the feed. The only way to get their attention is by uploading content when they are actively scrolling.

And that’s the reason why it is very important to know your own best time to post content on Instagram. If you do it the right way, you can hack the algorithm and maximize the reach of your posts. This will get you more engagement and increase your followers.

1. Learn about your audience

As we discussed in the beginning, knowing your audience is the most crucial to find your best time for Instagram. And the best way to learn about your audience is through the native Instagram tool known as Instagram Insights.

When you have a business account or a creator account on Instagram, you can find the option of viewing insights. This section is a rich source of information about your followers. It will provide you with all the data that you need related to your audience. It includes their location, age, gender, and when they are the most active on Instagram. You can also study customer feedbacks for a more in-depth analysis of your audience.

When you are using a creator account, you will get access to the Instagram creator studio dashboard. This dashboard provides you with valuable insights related to your audience, including detailed information of when they are online. There is also access to growth insights and discovery data.

2. Carry out A/B testing

Do not limit your post schedule on Instagram to only the best time. Try and experiment with other time schedules too. There is nothing like “set it and forget it” on Instagram, as the algorithm keeps on changing. 

Start by picking up at least 5 different posting times throughout the week. Let’s assume your insights section shows that your audience is active between 6 pm-10 pm. You should then schedule your posts for 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 pm.

In the following week, switch the posting times. If you posted on Monday at 6 pm in first week, post at 7 pm in week 2. Maintain all this data in a spreadsheet.

This process might take a few weeks. However, this data can be used to find your own best time for Instagram and receive maximum engagement. 

3. Measure your progress

As discussed above, when you carry out A/B testing, prepare a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet contains information about the posts, the date and time of posting, the likes received, and the comments made. Do this for a month, and you will have your own Instagram data. You can use this data to choose the best time to post thereafter.

Again, using RecurPost’s Instagram post scheduler does this for you automatically.

4. Optimize your content

Posting at the best time will not give you all the results that you want. You need to work on the content that you put in front of your audience. Post high-quality high-definition photos and videos which will make people stop and check out your content.

Write indulging captions and ask people to leave their reviews and opinions in the comments. Use the correct hashtags that belong to your niche to reach the maximum number of people. Thus, clubbing the best-optimized content with the best time to post will work wonders for your Instagram profile.

5. Schedule your content

Prepare your entire month’s content well in advance and schedule them using a Social Media Scheduling tool, such as RecurPost. When you use RecurPost for scheduling, it will study the engagement level of your Instagram profile and find you the best time to post.

This way, you can ensure that the right content goes out at the right time on your Instagram feed. You can even use the personalized insights that RecurPost provides. In addition to the above data provided, you will have an extra perspective. RecurPost will find your best time to post on Instagram if you have a unique case. RecurPost is one of the most acceptable eclincher Alternatives since it provides the most excellent hashtag recommendations.

6. Save your important posts for weekdays

B2B companies and other brands get the most engagement during weekdays. You should make it a practice to post your best content during that time on Instagram. Experiment on weekends using content that does not affect much to your brand much even if fewer people see it. Make a spreadsheet and start jotting down every single detail related to the engagement received. It will clarify whether weekends are your cup of tea or not.

Generally speaking, the best times to post on Instagram are during lunchtime (11 am -1 pm) and evening (7 pm -9 pm). But how can you manage posting during job hours? Instead of posting from your work desk, schedule your Instagram posts whenever you are free. This way you don’t have to worry about posting them in real time!

Read More: How to Add Music to Instagram Story?

Key Considerations When looking for the Best Times to Post on Instagram

Numerous people worldwide have no clue that they must follow a pattern when searching for the best time to post on Instagram for likes and better reach. Following are the things that will help you acquire more likes:

• Consistency Of Posting On Instagram: There is no denying that you must frequently post to keep your Instagram profile current. The trends keep changing on Instagram day and night today. If you don’t incorporate them in your profile, your content may not keep up with the audience. So make frequent posts on Instagram and keep them the apt mix of product-related and fun.
• Choose The Right Days Of The Week: The best days to post on Instagram play a highly vital role than you can think of. Even when the time of posting stays the same, the change of the day may lead to enormous variation in the reach. To state an example, if you decide to post around 5 in the morning for one week, you will automatically witness that the reach is better on the weekdays than the weekends. Some people tend to check their phones first thing in the morning on the weekdays, which leads to better reach than weekends. However, you may witness a drop on Mondays as people rush and transform themselves to get into the work mode from a fun weekend.
• Track Your Target Audience: You should have a hang of all these good times to post on Instagram and worst times to post on Instagram blogs. Suppose your audience is different from those mentioned in the blog, then these best hours to post on Instagram aren’t worth it for you. But your primary job should be to identify your target audience and understand if it’s different from the typical audience. If you want to check when is your target audience most active, go to the Instagram insights and uncover it. Now customize your posting timings accordingly for more likes and better reach.
• Keep People’s Work Breaks In Mind: Undeniably, numerous people get tired of working 9:00 am- 5:00 pm. Hence, they prefer checking Instagram during break time just for refreshment. If you are a brand looking for social media as a source to gain audience traction, you must ensure to take advantage of this break time mindfully.
• Utilize Time Zones To Your Advantage: According to our research, the more comprehensive your target audience’s geographical spread, the less complicated Instagram posting time becomes. If your target audience is coming from a particular location, ensure you set the timings according to them, even if you are not in the exact location.

When Is The Best Time To Post On Instagram By Location?

Following are some of the best timings according to the different locations:

• Best time to post on Instagram Australia: According to speculated data, the best time to post on Instagram is between 8:00 pm- 9:00 pm Sydney time, weekdays. The other time which is extremely common is 7:00 am, weekdays.
• Best time to post on Instagram USA: Post around 11:00 am on the weekends and Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays post around 5 am (CDT). We encourage you to post early morning because people mainly check their Instagram feed as soon as they wake up these days. You can also consider times between 11 in the morning and 3 in the noon, as people are mostly taking work breaks during this time.
• Best time to post on Instagram UK: According to our research, posting on Instagram between 2:00 pm-4:00 pm. Posting around this time slot in the UK can excessively increase your engagement.
• Best time to post Instagram Malaysia: The best time to post in Southeast Asia is between 11:00 pm-4:00 am.
• Best time to post on Instagram in California: The best time to post on Instagram in California, the US, and Canada (Western) would be 12:00 am- 6:00 am.
• Best time to post on Instagram Europe: According to our research, the best time to post on Instagram Europe is as follows:
  Europe (Western): 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm | Europe (Eastern): 5:00 am – 7:00 am

How to Find the Best Time to Post on Instagram Through Personal Experimentation?

The most beneficial factor with an Instagram business account is that you get the freedom to use insights. Yes, that’s right. The insights help you uncover both the best time to post on Instagram for likes and the worst day to post on Instagram for your account. The insights will briefly help you understand when your Instagram followers are the most active, and you can efficiently customize your post timings accordingly. The Instagram business account insight feature also includes audience insights, like advanced data for when your followers are online.

How to Schedule for your Best Time to Post on Instagram

Now you practically know everything about the right time to post on Instagram. You have figured out how to gain the highest engagement levels. Next, you must schedule all your content according to the collected data. 

There are many reasons for using a social media scheduler, but the best is the ability to send out posts consistently at appropriate times. Using RecurPost, doing that is as easy as pie.

You just need to upload all your content in the content libraries and select the timings to post. Its drag-and-drop editor is amazingly convenient to use. You can also create recurring schedules that will help to keep driving traffic from your best-performing content.

Additionally, it will show you your tailored reports of timings when your content is performing the best (and the worst).

When you are unsure about when to schedule a particular post, you can leave that on RecurPost. There is an option of ‘Auto-schedule for best time.’ Just select the best time checkbox while scheduling a post. RecurPost will automatically upload it according to your audience’s past interactions with your account. If you are looking for strong free hootsuite alternatives, RecurPost can prove to be your best pick.

Strategically plan schedule, and post your content during the best time on Instagram. You will be able to drive more engagement, gain followers, obtain leads, and build your brand’s identity!

What is the Best time to post on Instagram during the pandemic? (Covid-19)

We know that a lot has changed because of the pandemic. Covid-19 has impacted every life aspect, including social media behavior and usage. There has been a massive increase in the use of social media platforms. We have seen considerable shifts in the users’ active time. For brands, this resulted in an increased opportunity of putting out great content and get more engagement.

Thus, we have gathered data based on engagement trends and found out the best times in lockdown. Overall, the best times to post on Instagram est are on Monday, Tuesday, and Friday from 11 am to 2 pm.

As compared to other social media platforms, Instagram has seen an expansion inactive times. You can experiment with posting times without any issues. You will still see considerable engagement on your profile, as a majority of people are scrolling through their feeds. Try to post more on weekdays in the mornings and afternoons.

How to Find the Best Time to Post on Instagram For Your Business?

In order to provide a personalized experience to your businesses’ Instagram followers, you will need to figure out when they are the most active on the platform and then present them with your best content. The more effectively you do it, the more likely it is that they will see and interact with your social media posts.

Here’s how to find your own best time to post on Instagram with RecurPost:

• If you have a new social media profile, start by making informed guesses. When you post on social media, consider logically when your audience might be online and engaged.
• If you are aware of your target market’s general location, you can utilize that knowledge to support your hypothesis. If you own a local firm in the Philippines, for instance, you might want to concentrate on the hours when Filipinos are up.
• Once you have a handful of guesses, you need to start testing them by setting up schedules at various times.
• Select a few times and schedule posts accordingly using RecurPost’s custom schedule options.
• Experiment with different timings over a few weeks to start gaining insights.
• You can also use RecurPost’s best time schedules to automatically schedule your posts for the best time to post on Instagram.
• You can begin your analysis of the outcomes once you have several weeks’ worth of data.
• Go through RecurPost’s reports section to see how well your posts performed, which posts received the highest engagement, and see your top posts. Note these timings to fine-tune your posting timings further.
• You can also utilize Instagram’s insights section that is available on the app itself. The days and times when your followers are most active can be found in the Audience section of your Instagram Insights.

Best Time to Post Reels on Instagram

The TikTok period has led to an increase in video-based content.

Try publishing during these times if you want your Instagram Reels posts to engage your followers:

• Wednesday at 11 am and Friday from 10 am to 11 am
• Monday to Friday, 9 am to 4 pm

The best time to post reels on Instagram by day are as follows:

• Monday: 6 am, 10 am, 10 pm
• Tuesday: 2 am, 4 am, 9 am
• Wednesday: 7 am, 8 am, 11 pm
• Thursday: 9 am, 12 am, 7 pm
• Friday: 5 am, 1 pm, 3 pm
• Saturday: 11 am, 7 pm, 8 pm
• Sunday: 7 am, 8 am, 4 pm

Worst Time to Post Reels on Instagram

Let’s consider how people normally go about their daily lives.

Although participation levels are typically lower on weekends, don’t completely disregard them. If you post on Saturday at the appropriate time, it may be a good day to post reels on Instagram.

Sunday evenings are typically a time of strong engagement for brands that sell consumer products.

However, it has been widely agreed that Sundays are often the worst days to post because people are relaxing or getting ready for the coming week. As a result, they usually don’t look through social media as often.

On Sunday evening, though, there are some surprisingly high levels of involvement.

And speaking of Mondays, don’t we all dread them? Given that people are settling into their weekly routines, engagement levels on this day will probably be lower than they are on other weekdays.

How to Effectively Use Multiple Best Times to Post on Instagram?

After all the trying and testing, there will come a point where you might feel that there is no single best time to post on Instagram. You cannot be dependent on just one time of the day or week for posting on Instagram to get the best reach and engagement. 

However, it is also a bit difficult and overwhelming to post during multiple time slots on different days while managing multiple social media accounts. You can choose to manually post on numerous time slots or give up on many time slots and choose the ideal hour of the day. If you choose the former, you will waste a tremendous amount of time, while choosing the latter will cost you other, better engagement periods.

This is exactly where RecurPost’s social media scheduler can help. Using its ability to bulk schedule posts, you can easily create and schedule your Instagram posts for weeks or months in advance.

While scheduling posts, you can select different time slots for your posts to be published. Apart from your desired timings, you can also use the ‘auto-schedule for best time’ feature and let RecurPost automatically schedule your posts. 

This way, you can ensure that your account stays active throughout the week at different times and that your posts reach the maximum audience while getting the highest engagement. 

Tips for Finding Your Best Time to Post on Instagram Today

In order to find your best time to post on Instagram for today, you can utilize Instagram’s insights section.

You can find out which days of the week—and about what times—your followers are most active on Instagram by going to Insights Audience and scrolling down a little.

Based on your own audience, this data helps you understand when it is ideal to post during the day.

Why Can’t I Just Post At Any Time Of The Day On Instagram?

You are free to post at any time during the day on Instagram. However, if you want to receive the highest engagement on your posts and want the maximum number of people to see your posts, it is best to post when they are actively scrolling the platform.

Thus, instead of just blindly posting at any time of the day, you should consider the timings suggested above and figure out the best times to post on Instagram for your account.

Which platforms do RecurPost support in addition to Instagram?

More to Instagram, RecurPost allows posting on all popular social media platforms. You can schedule Facebook posts on your profiles, groups, and pages. You can also schedule LinkedIn posts to connect with global leaders on your personal and business pages. RecurPost also allows you to Schedule tweets on Twitter to build an organic community of people who belong to your business.

If you want to share appealing images of your products or services with your audience, RecurPost serves you by being an excellent Pinterest scheduler. It helps you to take the advantage of the visual platform.

Is your business ranking on the first page of Google? If you are still trying, start to schedule Google Business Profile posts with a call-to-action option for attracting buyers from your local market.

Summing Up,

Instagram can sometimes feel like a minefield, and that is the reason why it is important to be in sync with your audience. Knowing the best time to post will serve as a foundation of a successful presence on Instagram. You can utilize all the above data and you will soon have an audience that looks out for your posts and shares them enthusiastically! 

Also, you might be interested in topics revolving around social media and learning how Instagram ads work, how to do Twitter marketing, or the steps to run Facebook Ads. We have got a complete source where you can get rich information that will help you in making your social strategies strong. Our Blog has these and more, check it out now!

Frequently Asked Questions for Best times to post on Instagram