Instagram Feed Recommendations AI system
UPDATED JUN 29, 2026
The content you see on your Instagram Feed Recommendations is selected, ranked and delivered to you by an artificial intelligence (AI) system. Within one AI system, multiple machine learning models work together to deliver your experience. These models and their input signals are dynamic and they change frequently as the system learns and improves over time.
Overview of Instagram Feed Recommendations
When you view and interact with Instagram, one of the underlying AI systems delivers suggested content to your feed. This is content you may be interested in from accounts, posts or Reels.
Note: What you see while scrolling your feed might also include connected content and advertisements. That content is not powered by the AI we describe in this system card. Connected content is described in Instagram Feed.
How Instagram Feed Recommendations works
The AI system behind Instagram Feed Recommendations automatically determines which content shows up in your feed, and in what order, by predicting what you’re most likely to be interested in or engage with. These predictions are based on a variety of factors, including what and whom you’ve followed, liked or engaged with recently. Here’s how it works:
- Gather inventoryThe system gathers a portion of the public content available on Instagram, which may include photos and videos that follow our quality and integrity rules.
- Leverage signalsNext, the AI system considers a variety of input signals about the content. These signals might include how you’ve engaged with similar content or your interests.
- Rank contentFinally, the system ranks content from the previous step. Content that the system predicts will provide more value for you is shown higher in your feed. This helps the system make content recommendations that more closely match your preferences.
How to customize what you see
Your experience on Instagram Feed Recommendations is personalized based on your activity, and you have options to control or customize what you see. Below, we describe how to do this with different in-product features. Options shown here may not be available to everyone.
Not interested
If you don’t want to see a specific post, you can select “Not Interested” in the three-dot overflow menu. The system will no longer show you posts from that author and will attempt to demote similar content in the future.
Manage suggested content
The manage suggested content option shows you the content you indicated you were either interested in or not. It also allows you to access sensitive content controls to customize the recommendations you’ll see, snooze feed recommendations, and hide recommendations containing certain words, phrases or emojis.
Report content
If you see something you think goes against our Community Guidelines, you can report it to us. You can also report posts that you think are spam or false information.
Hide
You can hide a post so you’ll never see that post again. This action also helps to limit similar content from showing up in your feed.
See non-personalized content from people you follow
To see posts and reels that aren't chosen or ordered in a way that's personalized specifically to you, click "Following" on the home screen. On tablets, You will see a “Latest” subfeed option. Tapping on “Latest” will display content from accounts you follow in reverse chronological order, and will not include recommendations.
Save
You can use the save option to add recommended content to a saved collection. This can help the system show you similar content in the future.
How the AI delivers content to you
We want you to see content you enjoy and find interesting. To achieve this, the AI system has models that help it make predictions about content you'll find most relevant and valuable. These prediction models use underlying input signals to help select content you're most likely to engage with.
Below are some of the significant predictions-and input signals that inform them-that we use in this AI system.
How informative a post is
- This signal is purely generated by LLM to assess the post’s content quality
How likely you are to click 'Interested' if the Interested/ Not interested options are presented to you below the Reel
- The list of media that you’ve previously reshared
- How many impressions you’ve made on recommended content both within Feed (In-feed-recommendation) or after regular Feed (end-of-feed recommendation).
- The number of times other viewers went to the post author’s profile page after viewing the post
- The Instagram surfaces that you’ve visited prior to the current post
How long will the user spend in reels after clicking into a reels post in home feed
- The ratio of engagement counter to vpvd
- How many times a viewer enters feed reels in 7 days
- What is the device platform e.g. ios, android
- How many times a viewer views a video with sound on in 7 days
- How much time spent a viewer on an author for the past 84 days
How likely will the user scroll through the feed for a certain time, after viewing the top position post
- What is the device platform e.g. ios, android
- How many impressions a user spends viewing media in a specific age range (14-21 days old) over a period of 7 days
- How many impressions a user spends viewing media in a specific age range (1-3 days old) over a period of 7 days
- How many impressions a user spends viewing media in a specific age range (8-14 days old) over a period of 7 days
- How many reels a viewer viewed over a period of 12 hours
How likely you are to scroll to the next post
- How many times others have scrolled to the next post after viewing this post
- How many times you’ve viewed or scrolled to the next post
How likely you are to click on the profile of a post's author
- How many times you've viewed the author's profile and posts from that author
- How many times the author's profile has been clicked by followers
- How many times people have clicked on the profile of the author
How likely you are to click to comment on a post
- How many times you’ve clicked “View all comments” on posts
- How many times you’ve clicked to comment on posts
How likely you are to skip over the first post in feed
- How many times you’ve opened the app in the last 7 days
- How many times you’ve viewed videos from followers at a specific position on feed
- How many times you’ve viewed Instagram stories
- How many times you’ve viewed videos at a specific position on feed
How likely you are to click a reel to view it in full screen
- How many times you’ve opened the app in the last 7 days
- How many reels you've clicked to view in full screen
- Which device platform you’re using to view content, such as the web, Android or iOS
How likely you are to turn on the audio of a video post
- How many times you looped other video posts
- How many times others turned on audio on the post
- How many times you turned on audio on other posts
- How long you spent on other video posts