How to join someone live on instagram

How to go live on Instagram, stream with guests & join other lives

❘ Published: 2022-01-24T17:31:04

❘ Updated: 2022-01-24T17:31:04

Throughout Instagram are various creators live streaming videos to their fans. Here’s everything we know about how to live stream on your own Instagram account.

Instagram launched its own in-app live-streaming feature in 2016. Since then, the Meta-owned image-sharing app has built up the functionality with other features like questions and the ability to co-stream with your friends.

Much like how users go live on other apps like Twitch and TikTok, Instagram’s live video streaming provides a fun way to interact with your community in real-time.

Here’s how to go live on Instagram, including how to go live with a friend or request to join another user’s live stream.

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How to go live on Instagram

Open the Instagram app on your Android or iOS device.
Tap the “+” sign in the top right corner of the home page. Alternatively, you can access the same screen by swiping left.
This will open the New Post page. In the menu bar at the bottom, swipe right until you can select Live.
After the camera screen opens, you can tap on the four lines located on the left side to add a title or tap the heart underneath it to make your video a fundraiser.
Tap the circle button at the bottom to go live. Active followers will be notified, and when they tune in, their names will appear on your screen.
To end a live video, tap the “X” in the top-right corner and select End Now in the pop-up.

After the app ends the video, Instagram will show you how many people viewed your stream. You’ll also have the option to either share the video or delete it entirely.

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How to go live on Instagram with a guest

Repeat steps 1-5 above for going live by yourself.
Once you’re live, tap the icon of a video camera at the bottom of the screen. Search for the user you wish to invite, tap on their name and they will join your live video.
To end the stream, tap the “X” in the top right corner and select End Now in the pop-up.

The default invite list is based on users who are watching your live stream.

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However, Instagram does offer the ability to search for users who are not watching and will send a request to them.

How to request to be in another user’s live video

Open another user’s live video and tap Request to join – then tap Send Request in the pop-up.
You will receive a notification letting you know if your request has been accepted or denied.

There’s everything we know regarding how to go live on the image-sharing social media app. For more tips and tricks for Instagram, check out our other guides.

How to Go Live on Instagram by Yourself or With a Guest

You can go live on Instagram by scrolling to the "Live" tab on the "New Post" page.
When you're live, all your followers will be notified and can view your live video in real time.
You can also go live together with a friend, or request to join a friend's live video.

Instagram launched its live video feature in late 2016. Since then, the social media company has built up the function by adding other features like questions and the option to add friends to the live video, too.

Going live on Instagram can be a fun way to let your followers see events happening in real time, like a concert or special event.

Here's how to go live, go live with a friend, or request to join another user's live video.

How to go live on Instagram

1. Open the Instagram app on your iPhone or Android.

2. Tap the plus sign "+" icon in the top-right corner of the homepage. Alternatively, you can swipe left to get to the same screen.

Click the plus sign icon or swipe left. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

3. After tapping the plus sign or swiping left, you'll be taken to a New Post page. In the menu bar at the bottom of the page, swipe all the way to the right to select Live.

Select Live. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

4. A camera screen will open up. On the left side, tap the icon of four lines to add a title to your live video. You can also tap the icon of a circle with a heart in it to make your video a fundraiser.

Customize your live video. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

5. When you're ready to go live, tap the circle icon at the bottom of the screen and you'll be live. Active followers will be notified that you're now live. As followers begin to watch your live video, you will see their usernames appear at the bottom.

Click the circle icon to go live. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

6. To end a live video, tap the "X" in the top-right corner and select End Now in the pop-up. Once the live video has ended, Instagram will show you how many people viewed your video and give you the option to share the video for the next 24 hours so those who missed it can see it via your Instagram Stories. Or, you can choose to Delete video.

Click the X in the top-right corner. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

How to go live on Instagram with a guest

1. Open the Instagram app on your iPhone or Android.

2. Tap the plus sign "+" icon in the top-right corner of the homepage. Alternatively, you can swipe left to get to the same screen.

3. After tapping the plus sign or swiping left, you'll be taken to a New Post page. In the menu bar at the bottom of the page, swipe all the way to the right to select Live.

5. When you're ready to go live, tap the circle icon at the bottom of the screen and you'll be live.

6. Once you're live, tap the icon of a video camera at the bottom of the screen. From here, you can type in the username of someone to go live with, or search for them in the list of viewers. Select a user to invite them to join your live video.

Click the video camera icon. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

7. You can only go live with someone who is already watching your live video. But, you can invite someone to join your live video who isn't already watching — to do so, type in their username, tap the circle button next to their name, and select Send Request.

Send a request to your guest and go live in a room. Grace Eliza Goodwin/Insider

8. Once they've accepted your request, their video should appear alongside yours in a split screen. To remove your friend from the Live video, tap the "X" at the top-right of their screen.

9. To end your live video, tap the "X" in the upper right-hand corner and choose End Now in the pop-up. Once the live video has ended, Instagram will show you how many people viewed your video and give you the option to share the video for the next 24 hours so those who missed it can see it via your Instagram Stories. Or, you can choose to Delete video.

Note: To use Instagram's Live Rooms feature for creators, you can follow this same process to add multiple guests.

How to request to be in another user's live video on Instagram

1. Open another user's live video and tap Request to join.

2. Then, tap Send request to request to be in their live video.

3. You will then receive a notification letting you know if your request has been accepted or denied.

Meira Gebel

Meira Gebel is a freelance reporter based in Portland, Oregon. She writes about business, culture, and technology for Insider. Her work has been featured in Digital Trends, Willamette Week, USA Today, and more. She is a graduate of Columbia Journalism School and San Francisco State University. Feel free to reach out to her on Twitter, where she can be found most of the time, @MeiraGebel.

How to watch live on Instagram

The rapidly growing Instagram application used for sharing photos and videos is at its peak today. With each update, users are offered more and more opportunities, thanks to which the social network is already becoming global. The implementation of the live broadcast function further fueled the interest of the public. In fact, this is an online video recording with the possibility of commenting, which can also be saved. Thanks to this feature, celebrities, businessmen, bloggers, as well as ordinary users can broadcast live for various purposes (for example, communicating with fans, live advertising, informing subscribers about the company's work, services, and other points). Mere mortals can now reach for the stars by spying on someone else's life through Instagram. People whose accounts were created in support of their professional activities have new opportunities to increase interest in their person, product, etc.

The idea, by the way, is not new, similar functionality has already been implemented in Facebook and Periscope, however, a new feature in Instagram that appeared in early 2017 attracted everyone's attention and was warmly received by the public. So now live broadcasts on Instagram are the number one trend. Anyone can capture the attention of an audience. At the same time, the live broadcasts of Instagram profile owners do not always carry a semantic load, so do not be surprised if the host of the broadcast behaves strangely, inappropriate behavior is not uncommon. Since the function is available to everyone and everyone, in a fit of frantic desire to speak out and express themselves, users sometimes forget about decency. Basically, the broadcasts are still thematic and are created for a specific purpose, whether it is attraction to a business, contact with subscribers, training, etc. , or maybe the broadcaster just wanted to share his thoughts on any occasion. Not all users know how to find and watch a live broadcast on Instagram, we will deal with this issue.

How to find a live broadcast on Instagram

Broadcasts are displayed on the top bar above the news feed, where the stories are. So, if the user you are following is now live, then the thumbnail of his account will be surrounded by a colored ring, and the corresponding inscription “Live” will appear under it. You can join the view from the profile of the person who records the video online (a standard button in the form of a triangle "Play" will be available at the bottom of the user's avatar). Only the user who organized the shooting can save content to devices for subsequent publication or other purposes, but this function is not available to viewers, so other people's saved broadcasts can be viewed when the profile owner posts them on their page. At the same time, at the top of the record, it will be indicated when this broadcast was held.

Popular Instagram live streams can be viewed from the main search page. At the same time, the video is available in the recommendations if it is viewed by more than 500 users. You can receive notifications about the start of broadcasts if you subscribe to a profile. Thus, the organization of communication with subscribers is more efficient. The profile owner also has the opportunity to hide the broadcast from certain persons by specifying them in the settings, because no matter what the purpose of the broadcast is (increase the number of subscribers, inform about something, etc.), different personalities can join it, including including unwanted ones.

How to watch from your phone

You can connect to the broadcast at any time of the broadcast, you don't have to log in at the beginning, and you can also watch a friend's recorded live broadcast if he posted it on his Instagram page. A confident user does not have questions about how to do this, but many users have just begun to join the ranks of Instagram fans and have not yet had time to navigate. Watching a broadcast from an iOS or Android phone is very simple:

First you need to open the application on your smartphone and log in.
We see thumbnails above the publication feed, select the desired profile (in a colored circle with the inscription “Live”) or find a popular broadcast in the search. If you are not subscribed to the user whose broadcast you want to watch, you can find him in the search, after which by clicking on the main photo (avatar) we connect to the live broadcast (the owner will see the users who have joined).

While watching, you can leave comments in the comment box below, click likes, and if you do not keep up with the unfolding events on the air, you can rewind the chat.

How to watch from a computer

The web version of Instagram has limited functionality, so you will need to install additional tools to watch live on a computer. There will be no problems with this, the necessary software is available on official resources (in the application store, on the developer's website). You can provide conditions for the ability to watch live broadcasts on the Instagram social network from a computer using the following tools:

Android emulator.
Instagram application.
Browser extension.

Android emulator

We will emulate the Android environment on a computer in order to run a mobile application using the popular BlueStacks application. If you have an emulator, by launching it, you get the opportunity to work in exactly the same way as if you were using a smartphone, including downloading and using mobile software. First, the Android simulator needs to be installed into the system by downloading the distribution kit from the official website of the developer. The procedure is standard - download, select the installation path, accept the terms of the agreement, after which the installation is performed automatically. Next, do the following:

Launching BlueStacks. At the first start, you will have to wait a little while the program scans the system and applies the appropriate settings.
Upon completion of the setup process, you need to log in to your Google account.
After logging in, go to the "Application Center" tab, from where any Android applications will be available to us. In the search field on the right, we drive in the query Instagram.
Among the results, select the first official Instagram client in the list and install it by pressing the appropriate button, after installation the software will appear in the "My Applications" tab.
Click on the Instagram icon, after launching, enter your profile authorization data.
Now, you can watch users' live broadcasts on Instagram through a computer in the same way as on a smartphone. At the top of the interface, thumbnails of friends' profiles are available, and those who are broadcasting will be marked. Select the broadcast by clicking on the avatar.

Instagram application under Windows 10

For earlier versions of the Windows operating system, for example, if you have "Seven", this method will not work. We use it in the case when the computer is "Ten". To watch live on Instagram from a computer, do the following:

Installing an application from the Microsoft store.
Run the software, enter the profile authorization data (if missing, create it).
Stories will now be available at the top of the interface. If a user starts a broadcast, their profile thumbnail will be marked with a "Live" icon and you can join to watch the broadcast.

Browser extension

Another way to watch Instagram live is to install the special Chrome IG Story add-on for the Google Chrome browser, for which we follow these steps:

In the Chrome browser, go to the extension store.
In the left block in the store search bar, enter the query Chrome IG Story.
Select the desired add-on from the list of results and install it by pressing the corresponding button, confirming the action.
After installation, the extension will be available in the browser section (three dots in the upper right corner of the interface, select "Additional tools" - "Extensions"), where you can manage all installed add-ons (enable, disable, remove).
Click on the extension icon, as a result of which a window with user stories will open, to go to the broadcasts, click "Explore", live broadcasts will be available here. To join the viewing, simply click on the desired broadcast.

Broadcasts can be searched by name, tag or geolocation. In addition to accessing live broadcasts, you will also have the opportunity to download user stories to your computer.

How to watch live on Instagram anonymously

The user who created the broadcast can only see the number of viewers. You can see who exactly is present only by comments and likes, as well as when a person has just joined. If you do not want to show your presence, act as an observer, just watch the broadcast without commenting or pressing hearts. At the same time, many do not want to show even their appearance for a short time. To watch stories or live on Instagram anonymously, you can use one effective spy method that does not even require an Instagram profile registration. We only need the Telegram messenger installed on the device. It is interesting, including the fact that it makes it possible to use functional bots for various purposes. So, to view stories and live broadcasts incognito, we will use the IgSpyBot bot built into Telegram:

Open the messenger, go through the account authorization (create a profile if you don't have one) and go to "Contacts".
In the search bar, enter the address of the @igspybot bot, select it when it appears in the results and add it to contacts.
Launch the bot in the dialogue window with it.
We send a message to the bot, the content of which will be @nickname of the user whose broadcast, stories, etc. we will watch. We put the dog in front of the name, we send it.
In the menu that appears, select the user's broadcasts and the desired broadcast from those available in the list.
We are waiting for the content to load, after which we can view or download to the device.

Live broadcasts on the net are far from new, and watching broadcasts, as well as creating them, is not as difficult as it seems at first glance. After reading the detailed instructions on how to do this, even inexperienced users do not have questions.

How to start a live broadcast on Instagram from a computer

The web version of Instagram has the standard functionality for viewing and interacting with content: surfing the feed, viewing stories, the ability to like, comment or save a post. But, no matter how strange it may be, there is no way to view and start live broadcasts.

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How to watch Instagram live via computer

The web version of Instagram is not suitable for permanent use due to its reduced functionality. Live broadcasts have become more useful and popular, so it is important for someone to have access to watching live broadcasts on a computer. Below we have given 2 ways how this can be done.

The official Instagram app

The full app is only available on Windows 10. The process of watching live on Instagram from a computer is no different from that on a smartphone.

Using Android emulators.

These are programs that simulate a virtual mobile device on the Android platform. One of the popular and simple emulators is BlueStacks. After installing it, you will be able to download the Instagram application through the Play Market and install it on your computer.

You will have access to a full-fledged Instagram application on your computer, with which you can not only watch live broadcasts, but also publish content, surf the feed or go live yourself. A step-by-step guide on how to install BlueStacks and start live streaming from a computer will be covered in the next chapter.

How to start live on Instagram from a computer

, is identical to the standard functionality in the application on a smartphone.

If you want to use photos, videos or presentations live, you can do it in the application on the iPhone (this function is not available on Android). To do this, start the live broadcast and click on the rightmost icon at the bottom of the screen and select the desired file from the gallery.

After that, 2 windows will appear: one small with a speaker, the other full screen with material. By simply clicking on one of the windows, you can quickly switch between them.

If the live broadcast involves a presentation, prepare it in advance and save each slide separately. The presentation helps to visualize complex information and thus is better absorbed by the listeners. This format of live broadcasts is suitable for information business or educational accounts.

If you still need to live stream Instagram from your computer, download and install the BlueStacks emulator.

You now have an Android virtual mobile device. To access applications in the Play Market, you need to log in to Google.

Next, open the Play Market on the "My applications" tab, find the Instagram application in the search and install it.

The installed application will appear in the "My Applications" section, which is the desktop of the virtual device.

Launch and log in to the Instagram app. Now you can broadcast live on Instagram from your computer, as well as use all the features.

Conclusion

Like many restrictions on Instagram, the inability to view and start live streaming on Instagram can be bypassed using third-party programs.