Instagram Engagement Rate Benchmark

How has the Instagram Engagement Rate changed over time?

This chart shows the historical Instagram Public Engagement Rate for the past year:

 
This chart shows the historical Instagram Private Engagement Rate for the past year:

As you can see, the monthly averages are seldom static and the public and private rates don't always move in unison so ensure you're comparing the correct benchmark against the Engagement Rate you see in Social Status.

Highest engaged posts on Instagram

Below are the highest engaged posts on Instagram last month. Use the Time Interval dropdown to see previous months. These posts have the highest Public Engagement Rate across hundreds of thousands of Instagram posts published last month. You can tap the date on any post to open it directly on Instagram:

How to calculate Engagement Rate on Instagram

There are four different ways to calculate the Engagement Rate (ER) on Instagram 🙄

 

Unfortunately there is no "right or wrong" way to calculate it - just different approaches.

 

Let's run through them...

 

1. Public Engagement Rate

This is the most common method since it's used to benchmark against competitors. Remember with the Public Engagement Rate you're limited to just the publicly viewable interactions only. For Instagram this is Likes and Comments:

 

Post ER = (Likes + Comments) divided by Followers

 

Profile ER = Average of all Post ER's during the given time interval (ie: last month)

 

Notice how we divide by Followers (not Reach). This is because Reach is a private metric and not available publicly. Reach can only be seen by the owner of the profile or others with admin access. This is why we divide the public Interactions by the Followers.

 

2. Private Engagement Rate

This is the true way to calculate the Instagram Engagement Rate and its what we recommend for benchmarking your own performance historically over time:

 

Post ER = (Likes + Comments + Saves + 3-sec Video Views) divided by Reach

 

Profile ER = Average of all Post ER's during the given time interval (ie: last month)

 

3. Private Engagement Rate (Likes & Comments only)

Some marketers base their ER on the Likes & Comments only:

 

Post ER = (Likes + Comments) divided by Reach

 

Profile ER = Average of all Post ER's during the given time interval (ie: last month)

 

The rationale for this is that Likes and Comments are real interactions whereas Saves are not only hidden from public view but also behave as more of a "bookmarking" function than an advocacy action. As for Video Views, no physical action takes place but one could argue that someone watching more than 3 seconds of a video is indeed engagement in itself.

 

4. Private Engagement Rate (based on Impressions)

Some marketers base their ER calculation on Impressions instead of Reach:

 

Post ER = (Likes + Comments + Saves + 3-sec Video Views) divided by Impressions

 

Profile ER = Average of all Post ER's during the given time interval (ie: last month)

 

This is probably the least common approach. By dividing by Impressions, you'll end up with a lower Engagement Rate which is probably not the best thing!