Instagram10 posts a day, free
Free Instagram scheduler
Write it once, put it in the queue, and it goes out at the hour you picked. 10 posts a day on the free plan, across every network you connect, with no card. The same queue is driveable by your own agent, which is the part most free plans fence off.
What Instagram allows in a post
| Text | 2,200 Unicode code points |
|---|---|
| Images | up to 10, .jpg, .jpeg, 8 MB each |
| Video | 1 per post, .mp4, .mov, up to 15 min |
| Media required | a post needs image or video |
| Mentions | @handle |
Instagram allows 2,200 characters per post and 10 images, 1 video up to 15 min, from Instagram's own documentation as read on 2026-07-21. Shapeless enforces that table before a draft is queued. The full table is on the Instagram spec page; check a draft yourself with the free Instagram character counter.
Instagram's own free scheduler
More options inside the Instagram app's own post composer, plus Meta Business Suite on desktop.
- 1
In the Instagram app, tap Create, then Post or Reel, and pick the photo or video.
- 2
Add the caption, effects or filters, then tap More options.
- 3
Turn on Schedule this post or Schedule this reel, choose a date and time, tap Done, then tap Back.
- 4
Tap Schedule. Instagram allows up to 25 posts a day, up to 30 days in advance, and the account has to be public.
What Instagram will not schedule
- Stories are not on Instagram's list: it schedules reels, photos and carousel posts.
- Product tagging, collaborative posts, sponsored posts and fundraisers are not compatible with scheduled content.
Viewing, editing and deleting a scheduled post
- Profile, Menu, then Scheduled content under Your insights and tools.
- Options on a scheduled post gives Delete, Edit post, Reschedule or Share now.
You already shoot on the phone, you post a few times a week, and Instagram is the only network you care about.
- Instagram's own note: product tagging, collaborative posts, sponsored posts and fundraisers are not compatible with scheduled content.
- The app path is a phone path. Scheduling twenty posts with your thumbs is the reason tools exist.
- Business Suite schedules Instagram from a desktop, but it covers Meta's own networks and nothing else.
Read from Instagram Help Centre: create and manage scheduled posts and Reels on and Meta Business Help Centre: create and manage posts in Meta Business Suite on desktop on . Platforms move menus; the source is the place to check.
Schedule it by hand
Three screens, and they are the only nouns we use. Manual writes one post yourself and lets any account say it its own way from its preview. Queue drops it into the next free slot for that account, so you never pick an hour twice. Calendar shows the week and lets you drag a post to a different day.
- Connect Instagram once, under Accounts, through Instagram's own sign-in.
- Open Manual, pick the Instagram account, write the post. The preview beside it is Instagram's own chrome, not a rectangle.
- Press Add to queue for the next free slot, Schedule for an exact time, or Post now. All three are always on screen.
When the queue fires. Each connected account carries its own posting times, in your zone. Add to queue drops the post into the next free slot for that account, so you pick the hours once and never pick an hour again. We do not guess a best time for you.
After it is queued. Calendar shows the week; a post still in the queue can be opened and rewritten, dragged to another day, or cancelled, right up to the moment it goes out. An agent sees the same queue through posts_list and posts_get.
Composing, scheduling and publishing never spend credits. The $5 refilled each month is only for the agents that research, write, design and render.
Schedule it from an agent
The same post, the same queue, three interfaces. Mint a scoped key under Settings → API keys, or add our Instagram MCP server to Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or your own host and let it call posts_create. Tools that publish are flagged, so the host asks you first.
curl -X POST https://shapelessai.com/api/posts \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $SHAPELESS_API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"connectionId":"CONNECTION_ID","postText":"Three weeks of onboarding rewrites in sixty seconds.","queue":true}'{
"name": "posts_create",
"arguments": {
"connectionId": "CONNECTION_ID",
"text": "Three weeks of onboarding rewrites in sixty seconds.",
"queue": true
}
}shapeless posts create --to CONNECTION_ID --text "Three weeks of onboarding rewrites in sixty seconds." --queueSwap "queue": true for "scheduledAt": "2026-09-20T09:00:00Z" to pin an exact minute; leave both out and it publishes now.
Over the daily cap the API answers 402 with free_daily_cap, the limit and the reset time, so an agent can wait rather than retry blindly.
Questions
- Is there a free Instagram scheduler?
- Yes, two kinds. Instagram schedules posts itself - more options inside the Instagram app's own post composer, plus Meta Business Suite on desktop. You already shoot on the phone, you post a few times a week, and Instagram is the only network you care about. Ours is free too: 10 posts a day across every network you connect, no card, and the same queue is driveable by your own agent.
- How many characters can an Instagram post be?
- 2,200, and 10 images, 1 video up to 15 min, from Instagram's own documentation as we last read it on 2026-07-21. We enforce the same table before a draft is queued, so a post that breaks a rule is fixed rather than rejected at publish time.
- Can an AI agent schedule my Instagram posts?
- Yes, on the free plan. Add https://shapelessai.com/mcp to Claude, ChatGPT or any MCP host and the posts_create tool schedules through your connected Instagram account, or call POST /api/posts with a scoped key, or run the CLI. Publishing tools are flagged so the host asks you before anything goes out.
- Can I schedule a first comment on Instagram?
- No, and we will not pretend otherwise. firstComment is accepted for LinkedIn, X and Bluesky only; on Instagram the API answers 422 and names the rule. Instagram has no equivalent we can publish reliably.
- Does it post to Instagram by itself, or send me a reminder?
- By itself. You connect Instagram once through Instagram's own sign-in, and at the queued time the post is published through Instagram's API: a single image, a carousel of up to ten images, or one video, which Instagram publishes as a Reel. No phone notification to tap, nothing to finish by hand. Stories are not supported.
- What does the free plan cost me later?
- Nothing for the rail. Scheduling and publishing never spend credits. The $5 refilled each month is for the agents that research, write, design and render - a paid plan refills more of it and lifts the daily cap.
10 Instagram posts a day, free, plus $5 of credits every month for the agents that make them.
Start free forever