How long can your instagram name be

Social Media Post Character Counter

Crafting a witty Tweet, optimizing your Instagram posts with hashtags or brainstorming copy for Facebook ads may all seem like completely different tasks. But they all have one thing in common – they each have a platform-specific character limit.

More importantly, you need to know the ideal character count for social media posts. This could improve your chances of getting people to read or engage with your posts.

To make your job a little easier, we’ve put together a detailed guide on social media character limits and ideal post lengths. We’ve also included a free social media character counter to test the length of your social posts before you hit “Post.”

Facebook

Facebook ads character count

Facebook generally has the same character limit across all ad types, with the exception of carousel ads and in-stream video ads.

Headline – 40 characters
Body text – 125 characters
Link descriptions – 30 characters (20 for carousel ads and in-stream video ads)

Pair these Facebook ad character counts with our Facebook ad size guide to create the perfect ad.

Facebook posts character count

Facebook is the perfect place to share long-form content, with the platform allowing up to 63,206 characters in regular posts. This gives you ample space to tell a detailed story or explain something in-depth.

Ideal Facebook post length

But just because you can post a lengthy status update on Facebook doesn’t mean you should. In fact, short posts tend to perform better even on Facebook.

According to a BuzzSumo analysis, the ideal Facebook post length is around 50 characters (or fewer), which tends to get the most engagement.

That said, what engages your audience will also vary depending on your industry. So we recommend testing out what works for you specifically and trying out different Facebook post lengths to find the ideal character count for you.

Facebook maximum character limits

Besides posts and ads, Facebook also has character limits for usernames, Page descriptions and comments:

Username character limit – at least 5 characters and up to 50 characters
Page description – 255 Characters
Facebook comments – 8,000 Characters

Instagram

Instagram ads character limit

The character limit for Instagram ads is similar to that of Facebook.

Headline – 40 characters
Body text – 125 characters
Link descriptions – 30 characters

For more specifics around Instagram ads, check out our Instagram ad size guide.

Instagram captions character count

The Instagram caption limit is 2,200 characters. So there’s sufficient space to add context to your posts through your captions. It’s also important to note that Instagram captions are truncated at 125 characters.

Ideal Instagram caption length

While 2,200 characters is abundant caption real estate, huge blocks of text may look messy and distract people from the main focus of the post, i.e., your photo or video. The ideal length is 1-50 characters, as Quintly found that these tend to drive more interactions in an analysis of 5.9 million posts.

However, you may also want to test longer captions to see how your audience responds and how engagement varies by post type. For instance, longer captions could work well with informative and educational posts. But fun and casual posts may need just a few words in the caption or even a few emojis.

Check out some of the best caption ideas we put together to make the most of this space.

Instagram Hashtags

Maximum Instagram hashtag limit

Instagram allows you to add up to 30 hashtags per post. But stuffing your caption space with all the hashtags you can use isn’t always a good idea. In fact, using irrelevant hashtags could put your account at risk of getting shadowbanned.

Ideal Instagram hashtag limit

The same Quintly study found that fewer hashtags (between 1 and 10) tend to drive more interactions overall. For larger profiles with 10+ million followers, using zero hashtags worked even better. However, this doesn’t apply to smaller profiles (fewer than 1k followers) since their reach is more limited. For these profiles, using 10+ hashtags drove the most interactions.

Our Instagram hashtag guide has more tips and ideas on how to make the most of hashtags in your posts.

Maximum Instagram character limits

Instagram also sets a limit on how long your bio and username can be:

Instagram bio character limit – 150 characters
Instagram username character limit – 30 characters

Twitter

Tweet character count

Within the last few years, Twitter increased Tweet character counts from 140 to 280 characters.

Ideal Tweet length

Unlike with other social platforms, longer posts tend to perform better on Twitter, according to reports from Sotrender and the Chicago Tribune. The sweet spot is between 240 and 259 characters, which tend to get the most likes, replies, Retweets, impressions and link clicks on average.

Twitter maximum character limits

Twitter also puts a cap on how long your DMs, profile name, bio and handle can be:

DMs – 10,000 characters
Twitter handle – 15 characters
Profile name – 50 characters
Bio – 160 characters

Pinterest maximum character limits

Pinterest sets limits on the number of boards and Pins you can create to keep the platform running smoothly. Besides that, there are character limits to maintain in the text areas as well:

Maximum number of Pinterest boards – 2,000
Maximum number of Pins – 200,000
Profile name – 30 characters
Bio – 160 characters
Username – 30 characters
Board name – 50 characters
Board description – 500 characters
Pin title – 100 characters
Pin description – 500 characters

While Pinterest has a pretty lenient allowance on descriptions, only the first 50 characters will show up when people initially click on your board or Pin.

If you’re just starting out on Pinterest or looking for ways to up your game, check out our guide on using Pinterest for businesses to make the most of this platform.

LinkedIn maximum character limits

LinkedIn offers plenty of areas for users to enter text, with each having its own character limit. Here’s a quick look at some of them:

First name – 20 characters
Last name – 40 characters
Status update (personal profile) – 1,300 characters
About us/Summary – 2,000 characters
Company Page name – 100 characters
Company update – 700 characters
Company leaders headline – 150 characters
Company leaders description – 150 characters
Employee testimonials – 400 characters
Title of custom module – 150 characters
Body of custom module – 500 characters
URL label for custom module – 70 characters
Recommendation – 3,000 characters
LinkedIn Publishing post headline – 100 characters
LinkedIn Publishing content length – 110,000 characters

With LinkedIn offering a vast range of advertising options as well, the text character limit also varies depending on which ad type you’re running. Check out our comprehensive guide on LinkedIn ads to find out the specs for each ad type.

YouTube

While YouTube may solely be about video, it also has a few text fields. The platform puts a cap on how many characters you can use in these fields:

Video title – 100 characters
YouTube description – 5,000 characters
Playlist titles – 150 characters
YouTube tags – 500 characters total

Free social media character counter

Want to know if your social posts are making the cut in terms of character count? Paste your content into our social media character counter below and see if your posts fit the character limit.

The Sprout Social Compose box also comes with a built-in character counter, which will automatically keep track of your post length as you create them.

Make every word count

When you have such limited space to work with, you need to say more with less. That’s why it’s so crucial to know the character limit across all social media platforms so you can adapt your voice and approach accordingly. Make the most of this guide to craft the perfect social media post for your brand.

Want to make sure you create a compelling marketing message that’s within the social media character limits? Check out our guide on making sure your marketing message always hits the mark.

All About Instagram’s Character Limits

Character limits on certain social media platforms may seem, well, limiting a lot of times, but they also encourage users to be more creative with their content. On Instagram, the character limits imposed on usernames, bios, and captions, as well as the limit on the number of hashtags create consistency throughout the news feed and help facilitate cleaner, more straightforward, and more engaging content.

Let’s take a closer look at each of these Instagram limits and how you can optimize your content in spite of them.

Table of Contents

What are the Instagram Character Limits You Should Know About?

Instagram gives users a greater latitude when it comes to caption length, compared to Twitter’s 160-character limit. There is still a character limit, mind you, but it’s generous enough that anybody can get as wordy as necessary to convey their message. Keep in mind, however, that Instagram is more about the visuals, so the caption length limit is rarely a hindrance to one’s freedom of expression.

There are also character limits for the username and bio, which are more understandable. Let’s break down each one for you.

Instagram’s Character Limit on Captions

An engaging post is many things, but one thing that makes it truly effective is when it tells a good story both in words and visuals. Instagram allows users to create lengthy captions for their posts, but the maximum number of characters they can use is 2,200.

That number still represents a lot of words. In fact, everything you’ve read so far up to this POINT is only 1817 characters or 298 words! As you can see, that’s too lengthy for most posts on any social media platform. People rarely read through or even bother browsing over lengthy captions. With so much content to consume online, the majority of users prefer short, to-the-point, interesting, and easily digestible text.

When a post appears on Instagram’s news feed, the accompanying caption that can be readily read are the first 125 characters only. If your caption is longer than 125 characters, your readers will have to tap on “See more…” to reveal the rest of the text. Unless your post is intriguing enough or your audience is a loyal fan, they are less likely to expand your caption in its entirety. So to make sure that you always capture the attention of your target audience, keep your captions to 125 characters or fewer, as much as possible.

Instagram’s Character Limit for Usernames

Understandably, there’s a 30-character limit for the username. A good username, after all, must be easy to remember and relevant to your profile or brand and content.

You’ll have to wear your creative thinking hat to come up with a decent username; with roughly 1 billion active users to date, it’s getting more and more difficult to create a unique and catchy username that’s representative of who you are and that’s still available, i.e., not already taken. Fortunately, there are third-party apps out there that can help you generate good options to choose from or to give you inspiration.

Instagram’s Character Limit for Bios

Your Instagram bio should only be limited to your basic information, including your name, age, location, and a brief introduction. Instagram’s character limit for a bio is 150 characters, which is usually more than adequate to leave the impression you want on viewers and/or to let them get to know you enough.

If your account is for your brand or business, you can add a clickable link that will direct users to your website in case they want to learn more about you. The link can be the name of your website or a call to action.

A lot of well-known influencers on Instagram only have their name in their bio, and this is okay because they’re already popular. If you’re just starting to build your brand, it’s a great idea to make use of the bio section to share the most relevant information about you.

Instagram’s Limits for Hashtags

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past several years, you should already know that Instagram’s hashtag feature is a powerful marketing tool for businesses or an effective engagement booster for personal accounts.

The limit for hashtags is not for the characters but for the number of hashtags used per post, whether it’s a caption or comment. Instagram allows up to 30 hashtags but, again, maximizing this limit may work against you if the hashtags make your post look too cluttered or worse if you end up delivering a message that’s all over the place.

Remember that hashtags help generate more engagement by connecting your post with other posts that use the same hashtags. It’s also important to only use hashtags that are relevant to your content. Fortunately, Instagram provides related hashtags and an estimate of how many times a hashtag has been used; you can use this information to help you decide which hashtags to use based on their relevance to your content and their popularity.

Alternatively, you can perform a search for hashtags that are currently trending and create content around these hashtags, whether you just want to jump in the bandwagon or if the hashtags are actually relevant to your niche.

Can You Go Around Instagram’s Character Limits?

Username

For your Instagram username, 30 characters should be more than enough; whether your account is for personal use or for your brand/business, the most suitable username needs to be short, original, and specific to you or your brand. You’d want it to be striking and memorable, and using more than 30 characters for your username would not be effective for these purposes.

Hashtags

The limit of 30 hashtags per post is also more than adequate, as too many hashtags — even using up your maximum limit — can make your post look crowded, messy, and unappealing. Given that you don’t expect your audience to actually read beyond the first few hashtags and part of your objective is to maximize your hashtag relevance, using one too many hashtags can also mess up your analytics and give you inaccurate and inconsistent results.

Bio

There’s no getting around the character limit for the bio section. What you can do is place an external link in your bio to direct your followers to your website where they can read more about your brand. As much as possible, use a shortened URL (via a URL shortener) so the link won’t eat up a lot of your character quota.

Captions

Instagram is mostly a photo-sharing platform, but captions play an important role in generating interest and engagement. Many users get easily bored and quickly lose interest when a post has a lengthy caption and they won’t bother tapping on “See more” to see more of what you have to say.

The 2,200-character limit for captions is actually quite generous, but if you’re a blogger, for example, and your audience loves to read your posts, you can get past the caption limit by continuing your post in the comments section. Just make sure to let your readers know that your post is continued in the comments section. You can end your caption with a call to action, such as, “Read the comments section for continuation,” to inform your readers.

There are other ways to encourage engagement aside from telling an intriguing or delightful story in your caption. You can also invite comments by asking questions instead. The give-and-take practice is also widely practiced on Instagram, which means you can urge other users to like, comment, and or share your post when you make the initial gesture by showing interest in their status updates, stories, live feeds, etc.

Instagram’s Unfollow Limit

Instagram also imposes limits on certain activities on the platform to discourage spamming and the use of bots and automation. When it comes to the daily unfollow limit, Instagram has not published an official number; what they do is send a message to a user who is unfollowing multiple accounts when they are exceeding their limit for a single hour.

Based on some real-world estimates, the unfollow limit is around 150-200 per day or around 10-20 per hour. Keep in mind that follows and unfollows are considered the same activity, so if you’re on a following and unfollowing mission, both actions will be counted against your hourly/daily limit. Make sure to keep track of your follows and unfollows, and heed Instagram’s warning when you receive one; pause your follows/unfollows until the next hour/day.

If you continue despite the warning, you will run the risk of having your account temporarily suspended. This is why it’s also a bad idea to use third-party apps that offer automated follows and unfollows. Instagram detects these bot-like activities and suspends or even blocks accounts that use these apps.

Final Thoughts

A picture paints a thousand words, as the popular saying goes. On Instagram, photos are the main content — the star of the show, so to speak; captions only play a supporting role. Even for the writers out there, the platform’s character limit for captions is more than sufficient. And as writers, they have the necessary skills to keep things short, sweet, and engaging. The limits on username, bio, and hashtags are reasonable enough and easy to work with.

Remember that one of the keys to good engagement on Instagram is presenting unique and relevant content; if you feel that you need more characters than you’re allowed to make your content engaging, then you must not be doing it right and you should re-evaluate your work.

How many characters on Instagram* can be written in a post, story, profile header, comments and other elements

Instagram* has character limits everywhere - in the header, user information, posts, comments, messages and hashtags. If the limit values are not respected, the information may not be saved.

We will tell you in detail how many characters fit in each block and what to do if the text does not want to be rammed there.

Number of characters in header

Here is the basic information about your account or blog: username, nickname and profile description.

Bio

Part of the user's Instagram page* that is responsible for profile information. It is located directly below the account name.

In the block, users post useful information about the account: full name, nickname, field of activity, quotes, slogans, etc. If you have your own website, you can enter it in the line specially provided for this.

Nickname and Username

It will be easier for users to find your account if you write your full name or your brand name in the "Name" line. The number of characters is limited - no more than 30.

Remember that you can change the name no more than 2 times within 14 days. Otherwise, it will not work - the new data simply will not be saved.

In the "Username" line, you can enter your nickname or brand name in Latin. Here, too, you can insert no more than 30 characters. Instead of spaces, use numbers or underscores. nine0003

Account description

Think carefully about what you will be talking about in this section. The required 150 characters may not be enough to tell about your brand or personal page.

Read more in the article “Instagram profile header*: filling rules and interesting features”. There we talk not only about text, but also about suitable photos, logos, designs and much more.

If you still can't keep within the limited volume, there are some tricks. Use:

Profile photo text . This will help you “win” the space and tell more about yourself. Upload a main photo with your company or brand logo. Just remember that the text on the photo must be legible and readable. Soapy illegible text will not help you.
Emoji. Some words can be replaced with emoticons to save characters. It is important that emojis are understandable to users. Incomprehensible emoticons will at least miss, as a maximum, they will close the page and go to more understandable competitors. nine0038
Hashtags . One of the easiest ways to tell about your company and line of business. You can even come up with a branded hashtag so that your followers can use it in their posts and your profile appears in recommendations and hashtag searches.

Don't make the header huge, it's better to include the most important things

Number of characters in posts

An interesting video content or a bright photo can attract an audience. But in order to hook the user and make them open your post, it is desirable to create an interesting and informative caption. Under an Instagram post**, you can write not only short descriptions, but also long texts - up to 2200 characters with spaces. nine0003

In order not to think about whether the text will fit in the post, you can prepare publications through the SMMplanner deferred posting service. It will automatically calculate how many characters you have left, and write how many are left. In addition, you can prepare a signature template or contacts that you specify in each post. It's convenient - you've prepared a post, selected the desired template, and you're done!

You can always see how many characters are left under the post

Reading a post with more than 2000 characters can take 4-8 minutes, depending on the reader. Statistics claim that large texts in some niches attract more readers. But remember that the text must be really very interesting in order to be read to the end. nine0003

Smaller is better, but more informative. If your post does not do without long text, divide it - part of it in the description, and the rest in the comments. For other ways to place long texts, see our article “Large texts on Instagram *: why you need it and how to design it. ” There we discuss how to place large text and why it is needed at all.

Large paragraphs are sometimes hard to read, especially on Instagram*, but the audience of channels is growing, which means people are interested

Number of characters in comments

If you didn't have enough space in the post description, you can continue in the comments.

Instagram comment text* may contain emojis, hashtags, tags of other users. But all this should not exceed 2192 characters with spaces.

Active users should remember that Instagram* limits post commenting to no more than 5 posts per hour if they have the same content.

The maximum number of comments per day is no more than 200, otherwise the system will count it as spam. nine0003

And if you need to delete or hide comments, read our article "Instagram comments cleaning*: how to delete or hide comments". In it, we have analyzed the main ways to hide comments or delete them permanently.

Sometimes a story gets out of hand, beyond the scope of a post and is told in a few comments

To get more people into your comments, you can put relevant hashtags. What and how - in the article "Hashtags for comments on Instagram *: why you need it and how to use it." nine0003

Number of characters in stories

You can diversify and make your stories useful not only with the help of pictures, stickers and emoji. You can, for example, sell a car or a garage in your Story. Create a Story with a photo and overlay text on it - Instagram* does not limit the number of characters in the text in this form.

You can change the size and position of the text on the picture. The main thing is that the user can make out what you wanted to convey to him, and want to read it. Usually, the smaller the text, the less the desire to delve into. nine0003 The text on the right is noticeably smaller and does not attract attention

The number of views increases as a bonus, because if the user did not finish reading the first time, he can return to the story several more times.

Direct message volume

Direct is a way to chat with other users personally within Instagram*. A sort of messenger inside the social network.

If you copy text from the network and send it to any of your subscribers, remember that the message limit in direct is 998 characters, the rest of the text will not be sent.

Moreover, the message will remain unsent until its length is less than 998 characters. An over-capacity notification will appear and will appear every time you try to send a message if it is larger than the allowed values.

A notification will appear in the center of the screen, a long message will not be sent

More about how to use direct and what it is useful for in our article “Everything about direct on Instagram *: principles of work and life hacks”. nine0003

Number of hashtags

A hashtag is a navigation tool in a sea of information. Not only can it help you find information, but it can also help other users discover your product.

For hashtags to be useful, they must match the content of the post.

Keep track of the relevance of hashtags and select those that reflect the essence of the post and image. 30 hashtags is the maximum you can use in a post. This number includes hashtags under the post. More about this in our article "How many hashtags you can put on Instagram * - we answer." nine0003 A large number of hashtags in a row looks like an unreadable canvas

More about Instagram limits * - in the article "Instagram limits *: unsubscribes, companies, messages, likes, comments". There we discuss which numbers to focus on in order to secure your account.

Maximum size of Instagram blocks*

To make it easier, we have prepared a cheat sheet with the maximum volumes of all Instagram blocks*:

nine0132 Maximum number of characters nine0140

Block
Bio	30
Name and username	30
Account description	150
In posts	2200
Symbols in comments	2192
Storys	no restrictions
Message volume in direct	998
Number of hashtags	30 pieces

Ideal size

Many people are unhappy with the restrictions, but it's worth understanding that these restrictions serve to keep the text readable and relatively attractive. But this does not mean that you need to fill all the fields with information, emoji and hashtags as much as possible.

The ideal volume of publications, headers and even the number of hashtags is less than what the Instagram developers actually allocated*. nine0003

In reality, long text takes quite a long time to read, and users can scroll through the feed without even half reading it. They linger and read a long text only if there is something really interesting, or they are looking for something specific, or the main essence of the post is revealed in the first 200 characters.

The optimal length of the text for a post, especially if it is an advertising one, is at the level of about 150 characters. This volume is enough to describe the photo, reveal the values of the brand, and interest subscribers. nine0003

The number of hashtags would be perfect if it doesn't look like a grid of grids. The hashtags themselves should be relevant. We do not recommend using more than 5-10 hashtags that reveal the essence of the post.

Few and to the point - the main hashtags, a minimum of text, and everything is clear at a glance

We figured out how many characters fit in each block on Instagram*. Somewhere you can replace part of the text with an emoji or insert a hashtag to get visitors by tag along with the description. Remember that not always the maximum is good. Sometimes you can cut the text by 2 times so that it becomes capacious and does not lose information content. nine0003

In our blog, we analyze a variety of topics about social networks, promotion in them and business development. Come read :–)

*The social network is recognized as extremist and banned in Russia.

Making a profile on Instagram

Having taken up the maintenance of my page on Instagram, one of the points of its conduct was "to get acquainted with subscribers", in the sense that to look who subscribes to me. And what did I immediately notice? The fact that the primary photos on the pages of people on Instagram are striking descriptions of their accounts - it's more correct to say "profile design". nine0003

Undoubtedly, all spammers / offers to make money on the Internet suffer from excessive "decoration", but "regular" subscribers also decorate their profile at least a little.

What about me? Name, surname and address of the personal website (in personal Instagram). Similarly, in the "working" - the name and address of the site. Over time, it began to seem insufficient to me. But it’s true, what will the first person who gets to my Instagram profile see? - its layout. And on what and how it is presented there, it will not least depend on whether they subscribe to my account or not. Yes, and search traffic should not be discounted. nine0003

What do you need to write in your Instagram profile in order to subscribe to it?

1. Username - a beautiful / spectacular / memorable nickname

The username (indicated initially during registration in English or transliterated) is visible not only in the profile and under the photo, but also in the comments, in the search results. An unusual nickname may be of interest. Nickname "first name-surname" is considered obsolete, unless they are your personal brand and you want to develop it. nine0227 If the profile has any narrow focus, then it should be displayed in your nickname.

2. Bright / spectacular / stylized avatar

High-quality photo, well "read" in a small size of a loved one - ideal for a personal profile. For "working" - you need a thematic image. On Instagram, it seems like it’s forbidden to place logos and text on avatars, but for a “work profile” you can’t do without it.
The main thing is to make sure that the photo is clear, without "cropped heads", not blurry, not gray, etc. nine0235

3. Correct profile name - correct from the point of view of the search

After the avatar, the number of subscribers and the number of publications, there is a 30-character field, the so-called "profile name" (your name). It is highlighted in bold.

According to the idea, you should write your real name here, for example, Masha. However, marketers have figured out that Instagram search works on this field, and therefore it is necessary to write keywords here, i.e. those phrases for which you would like to be in the search for Instagram. nine0234 For example, if you sell T-shirts: T-SHIRTS IN SPB TO ORDER WITH PRINTS. Yes, it is with caps (you can also use emoticons!) to get noticed in the search results. And again, not trite, with fiction!
Or still the same Masha - HAIRDRESSER MARIA FROM MOSCOW.

4. Profile description (below the name field)

This information encourages you to subscribe if what is written in this field is in tune with your interests. What is your profile about? Use beautiful design (emoticons, hyphens), calls to action. Try! Experiment! Don't overdo it. nine0003

Don't forget that the number of characters is limited (150 including spaces and emoticons). You need to be brief, original and, most importantly, something to be remembered by the visitor.
For a personal blog: What do you do, what do you do, what project do you lead, what do you understand? What are your hobbies, lifestyle, hobby? What have you achieved? What do you write about on your Instagram? How to contact you? Link to a website or other social network.
For a work blog: Who are you? What do you do? How can you be useful to your subscribers? The user must understand at a glance how you will be interesting and useful to him, so that he subscribes to you. What do you offer (product / service). nine0003

Line breaks are placed on the computer,
emoticons/badges - on the phone.

5. Website is the only link on Instagram
The website field is the only place on Instagram where you can put a clickable link. Therefore, there should be a link not just anywhere, but the right one: to your website, your blog, online store, etc.

All these elements are followed by your photographs (publications), but about their design - for another time. And there is something to think about - a month of publishing my photos showed me that I was doing something wrong. That something is clearly missing if I want to achieve something from my page, and not just have it. And, obviously, this is the proper design (visual and textual) of their photos, regularly posted in public.