How to See How Many People Shared Your Instagram Post

One of the best signs your Instagram content is hitting the mark isn't just a like or a comment - it's a share. A share means someone found your post so valuable, entertaining, or relatable that they passed it on to their own network. This article will show you exactly how to find out how many people have shared your posts, Reels, and Stories, and what you can do with that information to grow your account.

First Things First: You Need a Professional Account

Before you can see any detailed analytics, including share counts, your Instagram account needs to be set up as either a Creator or Business account. If you're still using a Personal account, you're missing out on a huge amount of data about your performance. Making the switch is simple, free, and reversible.

A Professional account is the only way to access Instagram Insights, the platform's native analytics tool. This is where you'll find metrics on reach, impressions, profile visits, and of course, shares and saves.

How to Switch to a Professional Account

1. Open the Instagram app and go to your profile.
2. Tap the three horizontal lines (the hamburger menu) in the top-right corner.
3. Select Settings and privacy.
4. Scroll down to the "For professionals" section and tap on Account type and tools.
5. Tap Switch to professional account.
6. Follow the on-screen prompts. You'll be asked to select a category that best describes what you do (e.g., Digital Creator, Blogger, Entrepreneur).
7. You'll then choose between a Creator account and a Business account.
   • Creator Account: Best for public figures, content producers, artists, and influencers. It offers more flexible profile options and more detailed growth insights.
   • Business Account: Best for brands, retailers, local businesses, and service providers. It allows you to add contact information like a physical address and phone number directly to your profile.

Once you've made the switch, you won't be able to see historical Insights for old posts, but all future content will have analytics available.

How to See Shares on Individual Instagram Feed Posts

For your in-feed photos, carousels, and standard videos, checking the share count is incredibly simple once you have a professional account.

Here’s the step-by-step process:

1. Navigate to the post on your profile that you want to check.
2. Below the image or video on the bottom left, you will see a link that says View Insights. Tap on it.

A panel will slide up from the bottom, revealing the post’s performance metrics. Here's a quick rundown of what you'll see:

• Accounts Reached: The number of unique accounts that saw your post.
• Accounts Engaged: The number of unique accounts that liked, commented, saved, or shared your post.
• Profile Activity: How many actions were taken on your profile from this post, such as Profile Visits or Follows.
• Post Interactions: A breakdown of likes, comments, saves, and what you're looking for - shares.

You’ll see the number of shares right next to the paper airplane icon. This number represents the total times your post was shared directly to someone's Story or sent as a direct message (DM) to another user.

How to Find Share Counts on Instagram Reels

With Reels being a major driver of growth on the platform, tracking their performance is vital. The method for checking Reel shares is slightly different from feed posts but just as easy.

1. Go to the Reels tab on your profile and open the Reel you want to analyze.
2. While the Reel is playing, tap the three-dot menu (⋯,) in the bottom-right corner.
3. From the pop-up menu, select View Insights.

This will bring you to the Reels Insights screen, which shows metrics tailored for short-form video. You will see:

• Plays: The total number of times your Reel has been played.
• Accounts Reached: The number of unique accounts that saw your Reel.
• Likes: The total likes on your Reel.
• Comments: The total comments on your Reel.
• Saves: The number of times your Reel was bookmarked.
• Shares: The number of times your Reel was shared to someone's Story or sent in a DM.

Again, the number next to the paper airplane icon is your share count. For Reels, this is arguably one of the most important metrics. High share counts send a strong signal to the Instagram algorithm that your content is resonant, which can push it out to a much wider audience beyond your followers.

Who Shared My Post? How to See Your Story Reshares

While Instagram doesn't show you a list of every single user who DMed your post, it does let you see public accounts that have shared your post to their Instagram Story.

This is an incredibly useful feature for creators and brands, as it allows you to see user-generated content in action and connect with the people who are amplifying your work. There’s a catch: you need to discover these reshares while the Stories are still live (within 24 hours).

Here's how to check for Story Reshares:

1. Go to the original feed post or Reel that you're curious about.
2. Tap the three-dot menu (⋯,) in the top-right corner of the post.
3. If anyone has recently shared your post to their public Story, you will see an option labeled View Story Reshares.

Tapping this will bring up a screen showing all the current, live stories where your post has been shared. You can then tap through to view each one, reply with a "thank you," and even reshare their story to your own to acknowledge their support.

Note an important limitation: This feature only shows shares from public profiles and only lets you see them *while the Story is active*. If someone with a private account shares your post, or if the 24-hour window has passed, you won't see it in this list. For that reason, it’s a good habit to check your top-performing fresh posts for story reshares every twelve hours or so in order to be sure not to miss anything.

Why Share Count Is More Than a Vanity Metric

Understanding how to find your share count is great, but understanding why it matters is what will help you refine your content strategy. Shares are a powerful barometer of what truly resonates with your audience.

• It Signifies High-Quality, Resonant Content: A 'like' is passive. A share is an active endorsement. People share things that make them look good, feel smart, or connect them with their friends. If your content is educational, exceptionally entertaining, solves a specific problem, aligns strongly with a particular identity, or it's extremely funny or inspiring, it tells you that you’ve created something of true value.
• It Massively Expands Your Reach: Whenever someone shares your post, they are exposing your content to their entire follower base - an audience you likely wouldn't have reached otherwise. This is the heart of organic, word-of-mouth marketing on social media. One strong piece of content shared by a few key people can be far more effective in growing a social channel than running paid ads.
• It Builds Powerful Social Proof: When a prospective customer or new follower sees that many other people are sharing your content, it validates your authority and credibility in your niche.
• It's a Major Signal to the Algorithm: Social media platforms are designed to keep users engaged. When the algorithm sees a post getting a high number of shares, it interprets this as high-quality content that people want to see. As a result, Instagram is more likely to show your post to more of your own followers and push it onto the Explore Page, creating a true viral loop capable of exploding a post across a wide audience on Instagram.

How to Create Content People Want to Share

Now that you know shares are a key metric, how do you create content that earns them? To get shares, you need to be intentional. Think less about selling your product and focus instead on one simple question: how can you provide real value to your audience?

Here are six proven types of shareable content:

1. Checklists & Tutorials in Carousels: Break down a complex process into simple, step-by-step slides. This format is easily saved for later and shared with others who need the information. We're talking how-to guides, a cheat sheet, a useful list, an expert breakdown, and so much more.
2. Unique data, research, facts or expert insights: Did you survey your audience? Have proprietary data about your market? Did you discover and publish a surprising statistic that your competitors missed? Share one-of-a-kind information that proves you have something valuable worth sharing.
3. Industry opinion or commentary: Share bold or challenging thought leadership that others in your topic community will be quick to share with their own thoughts. You don't need a master's degree to have an intelligent take worth sharing. For example: an accounting agency can give a rundown of new tax laws, a marketer can decode a recent algorithm change, or a software developer can explain why one coding language is better for solving a specific problem.
4. Inspirational Quotes and Stories: People love to share content that is uplifting and motivational. Authentic stories of struggle and success or well-designed quote cards can travel surprisingly fast.
5. Relatable Memes and Humor: A meme that perfectly captures a shared experience within your niche is almost guaranteed to get shared. This shows you understand your audience's world and aren't afraid to have a little fun.
6. Strong Behind the Scenes Content/Day-in-the-Life Style Video Blogging (or Vlog): This helps humanize your brand or personality in a novel way that is almost guaranteed to increase engagement. People want to see "how the sausage gets made" behind the scenes, so don't be afraid to show them what your company is all about. This content performs very well as long as it's authentic.

Final Thoughts

Tracking how many people share your Instagram content guides you toward creating more of what your audience truly values. By using Instagram Insights on your Professional account, you can quickly see which posts resonate enough to earn that valuable share, giving you the data to double down on what works for organic growth. Analyzing performance data from your social media activity isn't just important - it's vital for success.

Once you start consistently monitoring metrics like shares on Instagram, comments on TikTok, or clickthroughs on YouTube, it becomes clear why creators need a single source of truth for reviewing performance data. That is why we built a simple, yet powerful cross-platform social media analytics dashboard directly into the intuitive drag-and-drop social media calendar in Postbase. This not only makes posting to social media more straightforward, but it also provides an instant source of analytical insight - a key tool in creating content that resonates with your audience.