How to Add a Manager to an Instagram Account

Thinking about handing over the reins to your Instagram account but hesitant to share your password? You're in the right place. Granting someone access as an account manager allows you to delegate tasks securely, scale your content creation, and get your time back. This guide will walk you through the proper, secure methods for adding a manager to your Instagram account, explaining the different levels of access you can assign so you stay in control.

Why Add a Manager to Your Instagram Account?

Before getting into the steps, it’s helpful to understand why this is such a valuable move for growing brands. As your follower count grows, so does the workload. What starts as a fun side project can quickly become a full-time job. Adding a manager, whether it's a team member, a virtual assistant, or a social media marketing agency, helps you:

• Scale Your Content: Consistently creating high-quality posts, Stories, and Reels is time-consuming. A manager can take over content creation, scheduling, and publishing so your feed never goes stale.
• Improve Engagement: A busy inbox full of DMs and a comment section overflowing with questions can be overwhelming. A manager can handle community management, responding to your audience promptly and keeping them engaged.
• Run Professional Ad Campaigns: Delegating access through Meta's tools gives your manager the ability to create, manage, and optimize Instagram ad campaigns without needing direct access to your personal payment information.
• Free Up Your Time: Most importantly, it allows you, the business owner or brand creator, to focus on the bigger picture - product development, strategy, and other high-level tasks - while an expert handles the day-to-day social media operations.

In short, it’s the first step toward treating your Instagram presence not just as a profile, but as a serious marketing channel.

First Things First: You Need an Instagram Professional Account

The ability to assign roles and permissions is a feature exclusive to Instagram's Professional accounts (either a Business or Creator account). If your account is still set to Personal, you'll need to make the switch. Don't worry, it's free and only takes a minute.

If you’re not sure what you have, here’s how to check and switch:

1. Open your Instagram profile and tap the three horizontal lines in the top-right corner to open the menu.
2. Go to Settings and privacy.
3. Scroll down to the "For professionals" section and tap on Account type and tools.
4. If you see the option Switch to professional account, tap it and follow the on-screen prompts. You'll be asked to choose a category that best describes your brand (e.g., "Entrepreneur," "Blogger," "Clothing Brand") and whether you're a Business or Creator. For most brands selling products or services, Business is the right choice.

Once you’ve switched, you'll gain access to analytics (Insights), the ability to run ads, and the professional tools needed to grant others access.

The Right Way to Add a Manager: Using Meta Business Suite

Gone are the days of sharing your password and hoping for the best. The safest and most professional way to grant someone access to your Instagram account is through Meta Business Suite (formerly Facebook Business Manager). This tool acts as a central hub for all your Meta assets (your Facebook Page, Instagram account, ad account, etc.) and allows you to assign specific permissions to different people without ever giving away your login credentials.

Here is the step-by-step process:

Step 1: Make Sure Your Instagram Account Is Connected to a Facebook Page

For Meta Business Suite to work, your Instagram Professional account must be linked to a Facebook Page that you manage. If you’ve already run ads or promoted a post, this is likely already done. If not, you can connect them directly in the Instagram app via Settings and privacy >, Business tools and controls >, Connect a Facebook Page.

This connection is what allows Meta's tools to control Instagram permissions.

Step 2: Navigate to Meta Business Suite Settings

Go to business.facebook.com and log into the correct account. If you manage multiple businesses, be sure you've selected the right one from the dropdown menu on the left.

Once you're in your Business Suite dashboard, look for the gear icon labeled Settings in the bottom-left corner and click it.

Step 3: Add the New Person

In the Settings menu, click on People. This will show you a list of everyone who currently has access to your business assets.

Click the blue Add people button in the top right. A new window will pop up asking you to invite a new user.

Step 4: Enter Their Email and Assign Business Access

Enter the work email address of the person you want to add. Important: Use the email address associated with their own Facebook account, as this is how Meta will send the invitation and verify their identity.

Next, you’ll need to assign their level of access. You have two main options:

• Employee access (Recommended Start): This is the default option and the safest choice for most situations. It lets you grant specific permissions for each task. The person invited has no administrative control over the business itself.
• Admin access: This gives the person full control over your Business Suite, including the ability to add or remove other people, change settings, and access financial information. Only grant this level of access to trusted business partners or senior managers.

For a new social media manager, always start with Employee access. You can upgrade them later if needed. Click Next.

Step 5: Assign Permissions for Your Instagram Account

This is where you specify exactly what the new manager can and can't do. On the left side of the "Assign business assets" window, a list of your assets will appear.

1. Find and select your Instagram account from the list.
2. On the right side, toggle on the permissions you want to grant for that specific account. Your choices will typically include:
   • Content: Allows them to publish, schedule, or delete posts, Stories, and Reels. They can also create ads.
   • Messages: Allows them to view and respond to Direct Messages (DMs).
   • Community Activity: Allows them to review and respond to comments, and delete unwanted ones.
   • Insights: Allows them to view your account's performance data and analytics.
3. Select the appropriate levels of access. For a general social media manager, you will likely enable all of these.
4. Click Next.

Review your selections on the final screen. Once you're confident everything is correct, click Send invitation. The manager will receive an email prompting them to accept access. Once they do, they'll be able to manage your Instagram account from their own Meta Business Suite or a connected third-party tool.

The Old Method: Using Facebook Page Roles

For years, the primary way to grant Instagram access was by assigning a role on the connected Facebook Page. While Meta is driving users toward the Business Suite, this method can still work, especially for simpler setups.

When you assign someone a role on your Facebook Page, they inherit certain permissions for the connected Instagram account.

• Admin: Can do everything on the Facebook Page and has full control over the connected Instagram account (posting, messaging, running ads, viewing insights).
• Editor: The most common role for a social media manager. They can publish content, send messages, respond to comments, and run ads for both the Page and the connected Instagram account.
• Moderator: Can respond to comments and messages but cannot create or publish posts. Useful for a community manager focused solely on engagement.

To assign a Page role, go to your Facebook Page, navigate to Settings >, Page Roles, and assign a new role using the person's email or Facebook name.

Note: This method is less granular than Meta Business Suite. You can't separate Facebook permissions from Instagram permissions, which is why the Business Suite approach is now considered best practice.

What About Just Sharing My Password? (Please Don’t)

While it might seem like the easiest way to get someone started, sharing your username and password is a significant security risk. We strongly advise against it for several reasons:

• No Accountability: If something goes wrong, you won't know who was responsible.
• Security Risks: You're giving someone complete access to your account, including your DMs and personal information. If that person's own security is compromised, so is your account.
• Login Issues: Instagram's security systems can flag simultaneous logins from different locations as suspicious activity, potentially leading to your account getting locked or disabled.
• Messy Offboarding: If you stop working together, you have to remember to change your password immediately. It’s an insecure and unprofessional process.

Using Meta Business Suite avoids all these problems and keeps your account secure.

Final Thoughts

Adding a manager to your Instagram account is a sign that your brand is growing, and doing it properly is a critical step in professionalizing your social media operations. By using Meta Business Suite, you maintain full control over your assets while securely delegating the day-to-day tasks of content creation, scheduling, and engagement, all without having to share your password.

Of course, getting your team access is just step one, managing the actual workflow is step two. Collaborating on content calendars in spreadsheets and sharing drafts in Slack can quickly get messy. We built Postbase to solve this by bringing planning, scheduling, engagement, and analytics into one clean, modern platform. Once your manager has access, they can use our visual calendar to plan content across Instagram, TikTok, and more, and use our unified inbox to manage comments and DMs without the chaos.