Instagram Stories & Highlights Scraper - Download Stories, Highlight Reels & Inner Items

Scrape current Instagram stories (24h tray) and all permanent highlight reels with their inner items from any public Instagram profile. Bulk download story media URLs, expiration timestamps, music, stickers, captions, and full highlight content - without an Instagram login, cookies, or API key.

What this Instagram Stories scraper does

For each username you pass in, the actor resolves the numeric Instagram user ID, then fetches:

• Current Instagram stories - every item in the active 24-hour story tray (images and videos).
• Highlight reels - every saved highlight on the profile with cover image, title, item count, and creation timestamp.
• Highlight items (optional) - every photo and video inside each highlight, expanded one request per highlight.

Returns clean ordered JSON with original-resolution media URLs, dimensions, expirations, accessibility captions, music, stickers, and links. Multi-source failover and residential proxies keep success rates high.

Perfect for story archiving, highlight repurposing, brand monitoring, and content auditing on Instagram.

Why use this Instagram Stories scraper

• No login, no cookies, no API key - works on every public Instagram account.
• Stories AND highlights in one pass - many scrapers do only one or the other.
• Highlight expansion - get every photo/video inside every saved highlight (not just the cover).
• Original-resolution media URLs - 1080-wide images and full-quality video.
• Multi-source failover - upstream rate-limited? The actor falls back automatically.
• Residential proxies built in.
• Beat the 24-hour clock - archive stories before they expire.

What data you get per username

{
  "username": "example_user",
  "userId": "000000000",
  "storyCount": 4,
  "highlightCount": 28,
  "stories": [
    {
      "id": "...",
      "mediaType": "video",
      "takenAt": 1714032018,
      "expiringAt": 1714118418,
      "imageUrl": "https://...",
      "videoUrl": "https://...",
      "originalWidth": 1080,
      "originalHeight": 1920,
      "accessibilityCaption": "..."
    }
  ],
  "highlights": [
    {
      "highlightId": "highlight:17876...",
      "title": "Wildlife",
      "mediaCount": 12,
      "coverImageUrl": "https://...",
      "items": [ /* same shape as a story item */ ]
    }
  ]
}

How to use the Instagram Stories Scraper

1. Click Try for free on the actor page.
2. Enter Instagram usernames in the usernames input (URLs, @handles, or plain usernames - all accepted).
3. Toggle what to fetch:
   • includeStories - the 24-hour story tray (default on)
   • includeHighlights - the list of highlight reels (default on)
   • expandHighlightItems - inner items in each highlight (default on)
4. Set maxHighlightsPerUser to cap how many highlights to expand (0 = unlimited).
5. Tune concurrency (default 4) and delayBetweenRequests (default 1s).
6. Click Save & start. Download JSON / CSV / Excel / XML / HTML.

Input parameters

Field	Type	Default	Description
usernames	string[]	-	Usernames, @handles, or full Instagram URLs (mix freely, auto-deduped)
includeStories	boolean	true	Fetch the current 24h Instagram story tray
includeHighlights	boolean	true	Fetch the list of highlight reels
expandHighlightItems	boolean	true	Fetch the inner items inside each highlight
maxHighlightsPerUser	integer	0	Cap how many highlights to expand (0 = unlimited)
concurrency	integer	4	Usernames processed in parallel
delayBetweenRequests	number	1.0	Seconds between requests inside one username pipeline
proxyConfiguration	object	residential	Apify proxy settings (residential required)

Top use cases

• Story archiving - capture competitors' stories before the 24-hour expiration deletes them.
• Highlight repurposing - bulk-pull every highlight from a brand to remix into Reels or carousels.
• Brand monitoring - daily snapshot of what creators are posting in their stories.
• Content audits - full inventory of a profile's saved highlights with cover images.
• OSINT and investigations - extract media from public stories with timestamps and expiration data.
• Influencer agency vetting - check how active a creator is by scraping recent story counts.

Integrations

Apify API

$curl "https://api.apify.com/v2/datasets/{DATASET_ID}/items?format=json"

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("goat255/instagram-stories-highlights-scraper").call(run_input={
    "usernames": ["example_user_1", "example_user_2"],
    "includeStories": True,
    "includeHighlights": True,
    "expandHighlightItems": True,
})

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(f"@{item['username']}: {item['storyCount']} stories, {item['highlightCount']} highlights")

No-code integrations

Send results directly to Google Sheets, Slack, Zapier, Make, Amazon S3, or your own webhook via Apify Integrations.

Pricing

Pay-per-event. One charge per username scraped covers all stories + highlights for that user.

Event	Price (tiered by Apify plan)
User scraped (primary)	$0.005 - $0.007

Apify subscription tiers (Bronze through Diamond) pay less per user. Apify's $5 platform free credit applies on first use.

FAQ

Do I need an Instagram account or API key?

No. The scraper works on every public Instagram profile without auth.

How long do Instagram stories last?

24 hours. After that they're gone unless saved to a highlight. This scraper captures them before they expire.

Can it download Instagram highlights?

Yes - every saved highlight on the profile, with cover image, title, and (optionally) every photo/video inside.

Can it scrape private Instagram accounts' stories?

No. Only public accounts are accessible. Private accounts return zero stories.

Will Instagram block this?

Multi-source failover plus rotating residential proxies handle Instagram's rate limits automatically.

How do I download the media files?

The actor returns imageUrl / videoUrl for every story and highlight item. Pipe those URLs to your own downloader, S3, or webhook.

How fast is it?

~15-20 seconds per profile with full highlight expansion (depending on how many highlights). Disable expandHighlightItems for a 5x speedup if you only need the highlight list.

Related Apify actors

• 📝 Instagram Posts Scraper - bulk export Instagram posts, captions, likes, comments.
• 👤 Instagram Profile Scraper - profiles with public emails and phone numbers.
• 🧰 Instagram Full Profile Scraper - profile + posts + stories + highlights in one call.

Support

Open an issue on the actor page if something breaks or a field's missing. Reviews are read and replied to.