How to Post on Instagram from Your PC or Mac

Oct. 21, 2021

Instagram recentlystarted testingthe possibility of letting users upload photos and videos from PC. The Facebook-owned company is now rolling out the feature to users through its official website. If you are someone who uses their PC to access Instagram, here’s how you can easily post on Instagram from your PC without your smartphone. We have not only detailed the official method to post photos and videos to Instagram on desktop but other nifty workarounds as well.

Instagram has started rolling out desktop uploads to all users. However, it may take a while for you to see the new Upload button. If you have not received Instagram’s new desktop upload feature yet, you could try other methods listed below in the meantime. With that said, let’s dive right in.

1. Log in to Instagram’s desktop website andclick on the new ‘+’ buttonnext to the button you use tosend Instagram DM onlinefrom your desktop.

2. From the ‘New Post’ creation interface that now appears,click on ‘Select from Computer’or drag and drop the image/ video to this page.

3. You can now choose to crop your image or set your preferred size. You can choose from three aspect ratios – square (1:1), portrait (4:5), and landscape (16:9). Once you are done tweaking the image dimensions,click on ‘Next’.

4. If you preferapplying a filter to your image, pick your desiredInstagram filterfrom the available collection on your PC. In case you are a purist or have already edited the image using any of thebest Instagram photo editor apps, you can safely ignore this step and click on ‘Next’.

5. In the last step, you can tag other Instagram users if you prefer, write the caption, and add a location. Finally,click on ‘Share’ to post the image.

And that’s it! You have successfully posted an image or video on Instagram from your computer.

If you are not seeing the new ‘+’ button on Instagram’s website, follow these steps to upload images to Instagram from your PC. Here, we will utilize Instagram’s mobile website to post the images and videos.

1. Open Instagram in Chrome or yourpreferred web browserand click on the vertical three dots menu. Up next, navigate toMore tools -> Developer tools.

2.Click on the ‘toggle device toolbar’ iconor use thekeyboard shortcut‘Ctrl+Shift+M’ to pick a user agent and access the mobile version of Instagram.

3. From the device toolbar dropdown menu, pick one of the listed mobile devices. For this demonstration, I will be using Pixel 2 XL. You can pick other devices like the iPhone X if that’s what you prefer.

4. Soon after you pick the device, you will see Instagram’s mobile version load up on your desktop browser. If you do not see it right away, refresh the page once. You can now choose to close the side panel, but I’m not doing it so that it preserves the website’s layout. Now that you have Instagram’s mobile site open on your PC,click the ‘+’ icon on the bottom navigation barto upload an image or video.

5.Crop the image if needed and click on ‘Next’at the top right corner to get to the next page.

6. Here, write the caption, add location, tag people, andclick on ‘Share’ at the top right cornerto post the image through the mobile version of Instagram from your Windows PC.

If you are using the Safari browser on Mac, the steps to access Instagram’s mobile website are slightly different. You can follow the steps below to access the mobile version of Instagram and follow along from the fourth step in the previous section to post the image.

1. Open the Instagram website in Safari and navigate toSafari -> Preferencesfrom the menu bar at the top-left corner.

2. From the Preferences page, switch to the Advanced section and check the‘Show Develop menu in menu bar’ checkbox.

3. After this, click on Develop on the menu bar andchoose the ‘User Agent -> iPhone’ option. You will now see the mobile version of Instagram open in Safari, making it possible for you to upload images and videos from your Mac.

4. Check the fourth step in the section above to post media to Instagram from the mobile website.

If you are looking for a third-party app to upload media to Instagram from PC, you can check out apps likeDeskgram(Windows, Mac) andFlume(Mac). I will be using Deskgram here and if you are using any other app, feel free to share it with others in the comments below!

1. Download Deskgram from the link above andsign in to your Instagram accountusing your credentials.

Note: Remember to always have2FA enabled on your Instagram accountto safeguard it against malicious actors.

2. After logging in, you will see the option to upload a photo, video, image carousels, story, and even Reels.Click on ‘Upload Photo’ to pick the image.

3. Drag and drop your image or click to pick the image you would like to upload to Instagram using the Deskgram app.

4. Crop the image to your liking andclick on the ‘Next’ arrow markto access the post creation interface.

5. Write the caption and tag the location andclick on the ‘Share’ iconto upload the image to Instagram. While you can use other apps to upload photos and videos to Instagram from PC, I found Deskgram to be efficient. Also, it’s available for free on Windows and Mac.

Post on Instagram from Windows PC and Mac with Ease!

So that’s how you can post to Instagram from your PC. While Instagram has taken its sweet time to officially add a desktop upload feature, we are glad that the social media giant (not just a photo-sharing app) is finally letting users upload photos and videos through its website. For more such Instagram tips, check out our articles on thebest Instagram featuresand thebest Instagram tips and tricks.

Subin writes about consumer tech, software, and security. He secretly misses the headphone jack while pretending he’s better off with the wireless freedom.