Instagram Post Scraper: Extract Captions, Hashtags, Mentions & Likes 📝

Extract captions, hashtags, mentions, likes, comments and timestamps from any public Instagram post URL. Paste a list of post links and get clean, structured JSON back. No profile crawling, no login, no heavy feeds. Built for content marketers, researchers, developers and AI agents that need fast Instagram post metadata.

Best for: caption extraction, hashtag research, engagement tracking, competitor content analysis, and feeding Instagram post data into LLMs, RAG pipelines and AI agents.

🚀 What does Instagram Post Scraper do?

This micro-actor takes a list of Instagram post URLs and returns only the essential text and engagement data for each post:

• Captions & descriptions: clean text with emojis and line breaks preserved.
• Hashtags & mentions: parsed into separate arrays, ready for analysis.
• Engagement stats: likes count and comments count.
• Post metadata: owner username, timestamp, shortcode and media type.

💡 Why use this Instagram caption scraper?

• Laser-focused: does one job, post-level text extraction, instead of bundling profile, reel and story scrapers into one slow, expensive tool.
• Fast and cheap: scraping direct post URLs is lighter than crawling whole accounts, so runs finish quickly and cost less.
• Reliable: direct URL scraping triggers fewer rate limits and blocks than broad account crawlers.
• Structured output: consistent JSON fields, exportable to CSV, Excel, XML or HTML from the Apify dataset.
• AI agent and MCP ready: predictable input and output schemas that Claude, LangChain and other agents can call without manual setup.

📥 Input

Field	Type	Required	Description
postUrls	array of strings	Yes	Public Instagram post URLs, for example https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/

Input example

{
  "postUrls": [
    "https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/"
  ]
}

📤 Output

Each post URL returns one JSON object.

Field	Type	Description
url	string	The Instagram post URL you submitted
shortcode	string	Unique post ID from the URL
ownerUsername	string	Username of the account that posted
caption	string	Full caption text
hashtags	array	Hashtags found in the caption, without the # symbol
mentions	array	Accounts tagged or mentioned in the caption
likesCount	number	Number of likes
commentsCount	number	Number of comments
mediaType	string	Post type, such as image, video or carousel
timestamp	string	Publish time in ISO 8601 format (UTC)

Output example

[
  {
    "url": "https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/",
    "shortcode": "DZxvMgyH8yR",
    "ownerUsername": "shayagrams",
    "caption": "Warli has always told big stories with the simplest shapes. Now your ring does too. 💚\n\n#ShayaByCaratLane #WarliKala",
    "hashtags": ["ShayaByCaratLane", "WarliKala", "Shaya", "Warli"],
    "mentions": [],
    "likesCount": 151,
    "commentsCount": 1,
    "mediaType": "image",
    "timestamp": "2026-10-13T12:44:01.000Z"
  }
]

🛠 How to scrape Instagram captions and hashtags

1. Open the Actor on Apify and click Try for free.
2. Paste your Instagram post URLs into the postUrls field.
3. Click Start and wait for the run to finish.
4. Download results as JSON, CSV, Excel, XML or HTML from the Output tab.

🤖 AI agent and MCP integration

This Actor works with the Apify MCP server, so AI assistants and agents can find and run it autonomously.

Actor ID: YOUR_USERNAME/YOUR_ACTOR_SLUG

Connect via MCP (remote server URL):

https://mcp.apify.com?actors=YOUR_USERNAME/YOUR_ACTOR_SLUG

Example Claude Desktop config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "apify-instagram-post-scraper": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "mcp-remote",
        "https://mcp.apify.com/?actors=YOUR_USERNAME/YOUR_ACTOR_SLUG",
        "--header",
        "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_APIFY_API_TOKEN"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Example agent prompt: "Get the caption, hashtags and like count for this Instagram post: https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/"

The input and output schemas above are stable and fully typed, so agents can call the Actor without manual configuration.

💻 Run it with the Apify API

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_APIFY_API_TOKEN")

run = client.actor("YOUR_USERNAME/YOUR_ACTOR_SLUG").call(
    run_input={"postUrls": ["https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/"]}
)

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item["caption"], item["hashtags"])

JavaScript

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_APIFY_API_TOKEN' });

const run = await client.actor('YOUR_USERNAME/YOUR_ACTOR_SLUG').call({
  postUrls: ['https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxvMgyH8yR/'],
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

🎯 Use cases

• Content marketing: study the captions and hashtags that work for competitors and creators in your niche.
• Hashtag research: collect hashtag sets from top-performing posts.
• Social listening and research: analyze post text and engagement at scale.
• AI and LLM pipelines: feed clean Instagram text into RAG, sentiment analysis or summarization workflows.
• Influencer vetting: check caption style and engagement on specific sponsored posts.

💰 Pricing

[PRICE] Check the Pricing tab on this Actor's page for the current rates.

❓ FAQ

How do I scrape Instagram captions? Paste Instagram post URLs into the postUrls input field and run the Actor. Each post returns its caption as clean text in the output dataset.

Can I extract hashtags from an Instagram post? Yes. Hashtags are parsed into a separate hashtags array for every post, without the # symbol.

Can I get likes and comments counts? Yes. Each result includes likesCount and commentsCount.

Does it scrape comments, profiles or reels? No. This Actor extracts post-level text and engagement data only. It does not download comment threads or crawl profiles.

Are private posts supported? No. Posts must be public and reachable through a valid URL.

Do I need proxies or cookies? No. The Actor handles proxy rotation and request formatting automatically.

What export formats are available? JSON, CSV, Excel, XML and HTML, plus access through the Apify API.

Is it legal to scrape Instagram? This Actor only collects publicly available data. Laws and platform terms vary by country and use case, so you are responsible for using the data in line with applicable laws, Instagram's terms and privacy rules such as GDPR. This is not legal advice.

Can AI agents use this Actor? Yes. It works through the Apify MCP server (mcp.apify.com) and the Apify API with fixed input and output schemas.

🛠 Support and feedback

Found a bug or need a new field? Open an issue on the Actor's Issues tab in Apify Console, and we'll respond as soon as we can.

⚖️ Disclaimer

This Actor is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Instagram or Meta. Instagram is a trademark of Meta Platforms, Inc. Only scrape publicly available data and respect people's privacy.