How to Fix Insights Option Not Showing on Instagram - A Comprehensive Guide

As an avid Instagrammer and social media geek, I know how frustrating it can be when the insights option disappears from your Instagram profile. Trust me, I‘ve been there! Instagram insights provide incredibly valuable metrics into your growth and engagement on the platform. But when that handy insights menu suddenly vanishes, it can totally throw off your social media strategy.

In this detailed guide, I‘ll walk you through exactly how to fix the insights option not showing on Instagram, so you can get back to analyzing your metrics and reaching your Instagram goals.

Why You Need Instagram Insights

First, let‘s discuss why Instagram insights are so crucial for content creators, brands and businesses on the platform. Here are some of the key benefits insights provide:

Track follower growth and demographics
See engagement rates on your posts
Monitor your reach and content impressions
Check profile views and website clicks
Analyze top performing posts and content
Identify when your followers are most active
Spot trends and patterns over time

Without access to these metrics, it‘s incredibly hard to gauge your Instagram growth and truly understand your audience. Insights allow you to make data-driven decisions to improve your content and Instagram strategy. The stats available in insights are vital for reaching your social media goals.

Instagram Insights Requirements

Now that we‘ve covered why insights are so important, let‘s talk about the requirements for actually accessing Instagram analytics. Many users run into issues viewing insights when their account doesn‘t meet these prerequisites:

You Must Have an Instagram Business or Creator Account

This is the big one. Regular personal Instagram accounts do not have access to insights! You‘ll need to upgrade to either a business profile or a creator profile.

I‘ll walk you through exactly how to switch account types later in this guide. But for now, just know that only professional Instagram accounts can use insights.

Your Account Must Be Public

Private Instagram accounts are unable to view insights. Before analytics become available, you need to make sure your profile is set to public.

This makes sense, as your account needs to be public in order to accumulate metrics like reach and engagement. Analytics don‘t really apply to private accounts with restricted visibility.

You Need at Least 10 Followers

In order to generate meaningful metrics, your Instagram account requires a minimum of 10 followers. If your follower count is under 10, insights will not display.

Once you hit that 10 follower threshold, insights will automatically become available on your professional Instagram account.

You Must Have at Least 1 Posted Piece of Content

Finally, your Instagram profile needs to have posted at least 1 piece of content – whether a photo, video, reel or story.

Accounts with zero posts have nothing for insights to track and analyze. So be sure to have some content published before trying to check your analytics.

As long as your account meets these prerequisites, you should have no problem accessing Instagram insights after upgrading your profile type. Now let‘s get into the steps!

Switching Your Personal Account to a Business Profile

If you have a personal Instagram account, you‘ll first need to convert it to either a business or creator profile before you can view insights. Let‘s go through how to upgrade to a business profile:

1. Open Your Instagram Profile

First, launch the Instagram app on your mobile device. You can‘t switch account types or view insights on the desktop site.

Once the app is open, tap your profile picture in the bottom right corner to open your profile page.

In the top right corner of your profile, you‘ll see a little icon with three horizontal lines. This is the main Instagram menu. Go ahead and tap it to open the menu.

3. Tap Settings

This will open a menu on the left side of the screen. Scroll down and tap the ‘Settings‘ option.

Instagram Settings

Tapping ‘Settings‘ from the Instagram menu.

4. Tap Account

On the settings page, you‘ll see various account options like notifications, privacy, security, and more. Scroll down and tap the ‘Account‘ option.

5. Tap Switch to Professional Account

Under the account settings, tap the button that says ‘Switch to Professional Account‘. This is where you‘ll convert your profile.

6. Select Business

On the next page, tap the ‘Business‘ option. This immediately switches your account to a business profile.

7. Choose a Category

You‘ll now need to select a business category that fits your brand or company. Choose something general at first, as you can always change it later in settings.

8. Tap Done

Once you‘ve picked your business category, tap ‘Done‘ in the top right corner to confirm the change.

And that‘s it! From the confirmation screen, Instagram may prompt you with some additional suggested settings for your newly converted business profile.

After following these steps, you‘ll notice your profile now has a few extra options like contact details, promoted posts, and – most importantly – Insights!

Switching to a Creator Account

If you don‘t have a business, but still want to access Instagram insights, you can also upgrade to a creator account. Here‘s how to convert your personal profile to a creator:

Just like switching to a business profile, start by opening your Instagram profile in the mobile app. Tap the menu icon in the top right corner.

2. Tap Settings

Tap on ‘Settings‘ in the menu to open your account options.

3. Tap Account

Under settings, tap the ‘Account‘ tab.

4. Tap Switch to Professional Account

Scroll down and tap ‘Switch to Professional Account‘ to begin converting your profile.

5. Select Content Creator

On the next screen, tap ‘Content Creator‘ to switch your account to a creator profile instead of business.

6. Choose a Category

Pick a creator category relevant to your niche like Fashion, Food, Art, Sports, etc. This helps classify your account.

7. Tap Done

Confirm your creator category and tap ‘Done‘ to finalize the switch.

After tapping ‘Done‘, your account type will officially be updated to a creator profile. You‘ll now have access to all the same Insights that business accounts can view.

Checking Your New Instagram Insights

Once your Instagram account is converted, here‘s how you can start exploring your new analytics and insights:

1. Open Your Profile

Launch your new business or creator Instagram profile in the app. Make sure you‘re logged into the upgraded account.

Tap the three line menu icon to open the side menu.

3. Tap Insights

You‘ll now see a brand new ‘Insights‘ option in your menu. Go ahead and tap it to open your analytics dashboard.

The Insights menu item.

4. Swipe Through Data

You can now swipe vertically to view your key Instagram metrics! This includes information like:

Followers
Reach
Impressions
Profile Views
Website Clicks
Followers by Age, Gender, Location
Posts and Stories by Engagement

5. Change Date Range

Don‘t forget to play around with the date range for your analytics using the calendar icon up top. You can view stats for the last 7 days, month, 3 months, year, and custom ranges.

And that‘s really all there is to it! With your profile switched to a business or creator account, you now have full access to Instagram insights. Time to start analyzing those metrics!

Why Isn‘t Insights Showing Up? Troubleshooting Tips

For most users, simply converting to a professional Instagram account will instantly unlock insights. But in some cases, you may still encounter issues accessing your analytics.

Here are some troubleshooting tips if insights are still not showing up after you‘ve upgraded your account type:

Double check your account is public – Occasionally your profile can get switched back to private, so verify it‘s public in settings.
Confirm you have over 10 real followers – Sometimes large follow/unfollow spikes can interfere with insights. Have at least 10 actual, engaged followers.
Check that your profile has posts – Post at least one piece of content and wait 24 hours for insights to generate data.
Try logging out and back into Instagram – Logging out and in again can sometimes jar things loose.
Update to the latest version of the app – Make sure you‘ve updated to the most recent Instagram app release.
Wait a full day after switching account types – It can take up to 24 hours for insights to fully activate after converting your profile.
Reach out to Instagram support – If issues persist, contact Instagram support via their Help Center for troubleshooting.

In most cases, insights will display fine after converting your account. But if you still have trouble, run through these tips to identify and fix the problem.

Switching Back to a Personal Account

What if you decide you want to revert your Instagram profile back to a personal account after viewing insights? Here‘s how to seamlessly switch back:

Open your profile and tap the menu.
Tap ‘Settings‘, then ‘Account‘.
Tap ‘Switch to Personal Account‘.
Confirm you want to switch back to personal.

It‘s super quick and easy to revert your account type at any time. Just keep in mind that if you go back to a personal profile, you‘ll lose access to insights and all your analytics will disappear.

Expert Tips for Using Instagram Insights

Now that you know how to fix insights not showing and access your analytics, here are some pro tips for making the most of Instagram insights:

Check Insights Weekly

Don‘t just sporadically view your Instagram insights. Set aside time each week for a dedicated insights review to identify trends and growth.

Pay Attention to Reach and Impressions

These metrics show how well your content is being shown to others. Growing reach and impressions means your posts are hitting more feeds.

Analyze Engagement Per Post

Dive into your top and bottom performing posts. This allows you to understand what content best resonates with your audience.

Verify Your Follower Demographics

Use the audience section to check the age range, locations, gender and languages of your followers. This helps inform your content.

Compare Time Periods

Viewing older vs. newer data side-by-side lets you spot growth patterns and changes over time.

Post When Your Followers Are Most Active

Check your followers‘ activity charts to determine when your audience is most engaged on Instagram. Then schedule posts at those peak times.

Monitor Your Profile Visits

This often overlooked metric shows how interested new users are in your brand, business or profile. More visits means you‘re gaining visibility!

Expert Instagram Insights Tools

Beyond the built-in Instagram analytics, there are also third-party insights tools I‘d recommend checking out:

Iconosquare – Offers advanced analytics, strategy planning, and performance tracking for Instagram.
InBeat – Provides in-depth audience demographics, engagement metrics, competitive benchmarking, and more.
SocialInsider – Tracks real-time Instagram analytics and engagement across your posts and stories. Provides recommendations to boost performance.
Sprout Social – Robust social media analytics platform for Instagram and other networks. Offers deep audience demographic and engagement data.
Hootsuite – Social media management platform with Instagram analytics integrations, ideal for agencies and teams collaborating on accounts.
Later – Leading Instagram scheduling tool that provides insights on best times to post, plan content, and analyze performance.
HypeAuditor – Instagram analytics specifically focused on in-depth influencer profiling, fraudulent follower detection, and sponsored post analysis.

These tools provide valuable supplemental data to complement Instagram‘s built-in insights. Definitely worth checking out!

Putting Insights to Work

Here are some of the key ways I leverage Instagram insights to guide my own social media strategy:

I check follower demographics to fine tune content for my audience. For example, tailoring posts toward the majority 25-34 year old female demographic.
Monitoring engagement rates helps me double down on what‘s working. I now post more behind the scenes clips since my audience loves that insider look.
Seeing 90% of my followers are in the US tells me I should optimize my content and posting times for US timezones.
I switched from random posting to a consistent schedule on Mondays and Thursdays at 5pm because that‘s when engagement is highest.
Reducing posts on Sundays and targeting other underperforming days has boosted overall engagement and growth.

Really studying your insights reveals what your audience responds to. Let data guide your Instagram strategy, not guesses. A scientific social media approach is the key to building a loyal, engaged following!

Wrapping Up

I hope this comprehensive guide provided the blueprint you need to fix insights not showing up on your Instagram profile. The key steps are:

Upgrade your personal account to a business or creator profile.
Confirm your account is public with 10+ real followers.
Post at least one piece of content to generate analytics.
Tap the new insights menu item to view your metrics!

Instagram insights reveal amazing details about your followers and how they engage with your brand. Don‘t run your Instagram account blind without tapping into analytics.

Feel free to reach out if you have any other questions! I‘m always happy to provide tips to fellow Instagrammers. Keep an eye out for more social media guides and growth strategies.