How to create Instagram RSS feeds

Did you know that you can subscribe to any Instagram user using RSS directly using any RSS feed reader?

Instagram happens mostly on mobile devices where users subscribe to users, post new media to their own accounts, and use other functionality to interact with other users or content on the site.

While there is an Instagram website as well for browsing user posts and tags, voting and downloading activity, it is fair to say that most user activity happens on mobile devices.

Some users may like the idea of subscribing to Instagram users using RSS. While that is good only for public posts that these users make on Instagram, it is a great way of keeping an eye on new posts of any number of users.

Best of all, it is not even necessary to have an Instagram account or a mobile device to use the functionality.

Creating RSS feeds for Instagram users

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Instagram itself offers no RSS feed functionality which means that it is necessary to use third-party solutions for that.

One of the better solutions is porvided by RSS Hub, a free RSS feed generator that is available online. The default RSS feed Url for Instagram is https://rsshub.app/instagram/user/USERID.

All that it takes now to create a valid RSS feed is to replace USERID with the actual ID of an Instagram user, e.g. iceland.explore so that the valid RSS feed URl is https://rsshub.app/instagram/user/iceland.explore.

You can open the Url in any browser and get the list of feed items, or subscribe to it in any RSS feed reader that you may use. If you have none, I suggest you check out QuiteRSS on the desktop as it is great.

The feeds work in any RSS feed reader.

Tip: you can download Instagram photos or videos to your PC.

Tips on looking up Instagram IDs

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One question that may come up is how you obtain user IDs. You may use the website for that but need to know certain entry points.

One good option is to open this URL https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/iceland/, and use the built-in search to find topics of interest. While that returns tags and not individual users, it takes just a click on a posted image to get the ID of the user who published it.

Another option that you have on the Instagram website is to type some characters to get username suggestions. Just use suggested usernames directly in RSS feed URLs or load the user's public profile on the Instagram website to look at posted media before you make up your mind.

Obviously, you may also look up usernames in the Instagram application to create RSS feeds.

Closing words

RSS Hub provides an easy way to subscribe to any Instagram user using RSS. The service works well and it is really uncomplicated to create new feeds.

The main downside is that you subscribe to private accounts or view any content that is not publicly visible.