Instagram Scraper: Posts, Comments & Stories

Give it a list of Instagram accounts. Get back their posts with full engagement data, their comment threads, and their live Stories — in one run, with no Instagram login and no cookies.

Built for competitor monitoring, creator and influencer tracking, campaign reporting and content analysis.

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What it does

• Posts by account — 12 per page, paging as deep as you ask for. Photos, videos, reels and carousels, each labelled by type
• Full carousel expansion — every still in a multi-image post, not just the cover
• Deep comment threads — up to 500 top-level comments per post, paged automatically; every record tells you whether more remain
• Live Stories — captured while they are live, with media type, dimensions and media count
• No login required — no Instagram account, no cookies, no session token, ever
• Every account accounted for — each account you supply comes back with a record, so you always know what was found
• 100% run success rate — retries, backoff and duplicate detection built in

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Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
usernames	array	—	Required. Accounts to scrape. A username, @handle or full profile URL all work. Post, reel, Story and hashtag links are rejected — they are not profile links. Invalid entries are skipped and never charged. Max 200 accounts per run
maxPostsPerAccount	integer	12	Posts per account. Arrive in pages of 12. Max 500
includeComments	boolean	false	Retrieve comment threads. Charged separately
maxPostsToComment	integer	5	How many of each account's posts get their comments retrieved, newest first. Max 100
maxCommentsPerPost	integer	50	Comments per post. Arrive ~13 at a time. Max 500
includeStories	boolean	false	Capture live Stories. Charged per account checked

Example input

{
  "usernames": ["nasa", "natgeo", "@zara"],
  "maxPostsPerAccount": 24,
  "includeComments": true,
  "maxPostsToComment": 5,
  "maxCommentsPerPost": 50,
  "includeStories": false
}

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Output

Three kinds of record, told apart by the type field.

post — one per post. The main output. story — one per live Story, when Stories are requested. account — one per account that produced no posts, so you can see what happened and why.

Field	Type	Description
type	enum	post, story or account
username	string	The account this record belongs to
profileId	string | null	Instagram's internal account id
displayName	string | null	Account display name
isVerified	boolean | null	Blue-tick status
profileUrl	string	Link to the profile
accountStatus	enum	ok, no_posts, not_found, unavailable
postId	string | null	Post id. null on story and account records
shortCode	string | null	Short code from the post URL
postType	enum	photo, video, reel, carousel
url	string | null	Link to the post
caption	string | null	Post caption
postedAt	string | null	ISO 8601 UTC
likeCount	number | null	Likes at time of retrieval
commentCount	number | null	Instagram's own count. Usually higher than commentsRetrieved
viewCount / playCount	number | null	Video posts only. null on photos
hashtags / mentions / taggedUsers	array	Extracted from the post
thumbnailUrl	string | null	Preview image
videoUrl	string | null	Video file. Video posts only
videoDurationSeconds	number | null	Video length. Video posts only
postsPartial	boolean | null	true when paging stopped early for this account, so fewer posts were returned than asked for
imageUrls	array	Image files, including every still in a carousel. A carousel item that is a video has no entry here, so this can be shorter than carouselItemCount
carouselItemCount	number	Items in a carousel, counting both stills and videos. 0 on single-media posts
mediaWidth / mediaHeight	number | null	Media dimensions
isAd / isPaidPartnership	boolean | null	As reported by Instagram
isPinned	boolean | null	Pinned to the profile grid
comments	array	Top-level comments. Empty unless requested
commentsRetrieved	number	How many comments this record contains
commentsRemaining	boolean	true if further comments exist that were not retrieved
commentsStatus	enum	retrieved, skipped_no_comments, skipped_limit, not_requested, unavailable

Story record

Emitted once per live Story when Stories are requested.

Field	Type	Description
type	enum	Always story
username / profileId / displayName / isVerified		Account identity, as above
mediaCategory	string | null	The Story's media type
width / height	number | null	Media dimensions in pixels
mediaCount	number	How many media files the Story had. The files themselves are not returned
postedAt	string | null	ISO 8601 UTC

Account record

Emitted once for an account that produced no posts, so a paid-for lookup is never silent.

Field	Type	Description
type	enum	Always account
accountStatus	enum	no_posts, not_found or unavailable
postsFound / storiesFound	number	What was retrieved for this account
postId	null	Always null on this record type

Comment object

Field	Type	Description
id	string	Comment id
text	string	Comment body
author	string | null	Username
authorName	string | null	Display name
authorIsVerified	boolean | null	Blue-tick status
likeCount	number | null	Likes on the comment
postedAt	string | null	ISO 8601 UTC
isPinned	boolean | null	Pinned by the account owner

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Pricing

Charged per account looked up, per row delivered, plus a small fixed fee when a run starts. Cheaper on higher Apify plans.

Event	Free plan	Business plan
Account looked up	$2.50 per 1,000	$1.50 per 1,000
Post	$1.60 per 1,000	$0.99 per 1,000
Comment	$0.89 per 1,000	$0.49 per 1,000
Stories checked	$12.00 per 1,000	$8.00 per 1,000
Run start	$0.005	$0.005

Why accounts are charged separately. Looking up an account costs the same whether it turns out to have 500 posts, no posts, or not to exist at all. Charging for the lookup keeps the per-post price low for everyone instead of loading the cost of dead handles onto customers with clean lists. Entries that are not valid usernames are rejected before any lookup happens and cost you nothing.

Stories are charged per account checked, not per Story. One check covers an account however many Stories it has — including none, which is common, since Stories expire after 24 hours.

Worked examples, at Business-plan rates

Daily watch — 10 accounts, 12 posts each, no comments 10 × $0.0015 + 120 × $0.00099 + $0.005 = $0.14

Deep pull — 10 accounts, 24 posts each, comments on the newest 5 posts (~50 each) 10 × $0.0015 + 240 × $0.00099 + 2,500 × $0.00049 + $0.005 = $1.48

Stories sweep — 50 accounts, Stories only, 12 posts each 50 × $0.0015 + 50 × $0.008 + 600 × $0.00099 + $0.005 = $1.07

Set Maximum cost per run in the run options to cap spend. The Actor stops cleanly at that ceiling and returns everything it charged for.

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Tips

• Start with Stories and comments off. Get the posts first, see which accounts and posts matter, then re-run narrowly with comments enabled.
• Five posts per account is usually enough to read the room on comments, and keeps runs quick.
• Schedule it for Stories. A daily or twice-daily schedule catches them while they are live.
• Keep your username list current. Every account you supply is looked up, so a tidy list keeps runs lean.

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Support

Report a problem through the Issues tab on this Actor's page. Issues are reviewed regularly.

When reporting, please include the run ID, the input you used, and what you expected.

For volume enquiries, custom requirements, or anything not specific to a single run, email socialhtz@gmail.com.