/instagram

name: instagram
description: Scrape Instagram profiles, posts, reels and comments as JSON through the Bright Data Scraper API. Use when the user asks for any Instagram data - an account's followers or bio, a post's likes and comments, the recent posts or reels of an account, the comments on a post - or says "instagram scraper", "instagram api", "instagram data". Routes between the CLI (`bdata pipelines run` with the Instagram dataset ids), the Python SDK (`client.search.instagram.*` and `client.scrape.instagram.*`), and the MCP scraper tools. Carries the credit costs, the reels timeout, the `post_type` values that work, and the error-row cases the API returns as success.

Bright Data - Instagram

Four datasets: profiles, posts, reels, comments. Three routes into them. Pick by what the user has and wants. The SDK lines were verified on 2026-09-11 against `brightdata-sdk` 2.5.2; the CLI and MCP lines follow `@brightdata/cli` 0.4.1 and `@brightdata/mcp` 4.1.0.

| Dataset | dataset_id | Methods | |---|---|---| | Profiles | `gd_l1vikfch901nx3by4` | `collect_by_url`, `discover_by_user_name` | | Posts | `gd_lk5ns7kz21pck8jpis` | `collect_by_url`, `discover_by_url` (a profile URL: its recent posts) | | Reels | `gd_lyclm20il4r5helnj` | `collect_by_url`, `discover_by_url`, `discover_by_url_all_reels` | | Comments | `gd_ltppn085pokosxh13` | `collect_by_url` |

Pick your route

| You have | You want | Route | |---|---|---| | a profile URL | the account's recent posts | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_lk5ns7kz21pck8jpis discover_by_url <url> --num_of_posts N` or SDK `client.search.instagram.posts(url, num_of_posts=N)`. `collect_by_url` with a profile URL returns `It is not a post URL` | | a profile URL | the account's recent reels | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_lyclm20il4r5helnj discover_by_url <url> --num_of_posts N` or SDK `client.search.instagram.reels(url, num_of_posts=N, timeout=420)` | | a profile URL | the profile | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_l1vikfch901nx3by4 collect_by_url <url>` or SDK `client.scrape.instagram.profiles(url)` | | a username, no URL | the profile | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_l1vikfch901nx3by4 discover_by_user_name --user_name nasa` or SDK `client.search.instagram.profiles("nasa")` | | a post URL | that post | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_lk5ns7kz21pck8jpis collect_by_url <url>` or SDK `client.scrape.instagram.posts(url)` | | a reel URL | that reel | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_lyclm20il4r5helnj collect_by_url <url>` or SDK `client.scrape.instagram.reels(url)` | | a post or reel URL | its comments | CLI `bdata pipelines run gd_ltppn085pokosxh13 collect_by_url <url>` or SDK `client.scrape.instagram.comments(url)`. One credit per comment | | no terminal (hosted assistant) | any of the above | MCP `run_scraper` with the dataset id and method above (see MCP below) |

Every route is an asynchronous job on the API: trigger, poll, return. Expect one to three minutes per call. One credit per record; 5,000 credits are free each month. Always pass `num_of_posts` on a discovery call: without it the number of posts collected, and billed, has no limit.

Setup gate (run first)

Run `node <agent-onboarding skill folder>/scripts/check-auth.mjs --for instagram`. Exit `0` means ready. Any other exit, a missing CLI, or a missing login is the `agent-onboarding` skill's job. These datasets need no zone, only the key.

For the SDK route: `pip install brightdata-sdk`. The SDK reads the token from `BRIGHTDATA_API_TOKEN` or `BRIGHTDATA_API_KEY`, then from a `.env` file found by searching upward from its own install folder, then from the CLI's stored login. After `bdata login` nothing else is needed.

CLI: run a dataset by id

bdata pipelines run gd_l1vikfch901nx3by4 collect_by_url "https://www.instagram.com/nasa/" --pretty
bdata pipelines run gd_lk5ns7kz21pck8jpis collect_by_url "https://www.instagram.com/p/Dc1W1uFj-CW/" --format csv -o posts.csv
bdata pipelines run gd_lyclm20il4r5helnj collect_by_url "https://www.instagram.com/reel/DcMXl1IPNtB/" --pretty
bdata pipelines run gd_ltppn085pokosxh13 collect_by_url "https://www.instagram.com/p/Dc1W1uFj-CW/" --pretty
bdata pipelines run gd_lk5ns7kz21pck8jpis discover_by_url "https://www.instagram.com/nasa/" --num_of_posts 5 --pretty

`bdata pipelines info <dataset_id> <method>` lists a method's input fields; each one is a `--<field> <value>` flag. `--format json|csv|ndjson|jsonl`, `-o FILE`, `--timeout SECONDS` (default 600). Typical times: profile 50s, post 40s, reel 25s, comments 10s.

SDK: recent posts of an account

from brightdata import SyncBrightDataClient

with SyncBrightDataClient(auto_create_zones=False) as client:
    result = client.search.instagram.posts("https://www.instagram.com/nasa/", num_of_posts=5)
    for post in result.data:
        print(post["likes"], post["num_comments"], post["url"])

Rules that are not in the SDK docstrings:

• **Always pass `auto_create_zones=False`.** Left on, the client tries to create

Web Unlocker and SERP zones on entry, which Instagram never uses and which fails with a 403 on accounts without a payment method (sdk-python#57).

• **Many URLs in one call is one job.** Pass a list rather than looping.
• **Shapes:** `search.*` calls always return a list in `result.data`.

`scrape.*` calls with one URL return one record as a dict, several as a list.

• **Date window:** `start_date="08-01-2026", end_date="09-07-2026"`, format

`MM-DD-YYYY`. `post_type="Post"` keeps posts only, `post_type="Reels"` keeps reels only. The docstring's `"Reel"` returns an error row and no reels (sdk-python#59).

• **Reels discovery needs `timeout=420`.** The 180-second default expires.
• **An empty window is a success with zero records:** it arrives as a row whose

`error` contains `There are no public posts in the profile for the specified period`. Match the message; a dead account uses the same `error_code`.

• **A dead account is a row with an `error` key** and varying text, for exa