Create an Instagram reel

You can create and publish reels directly to Instagram from Hootsuite. Reels are short videos that you can use to show your brand's personality and engage your followers in new ways. Your reels can also show up in the Explore and Reels pages on Instagram, so they're a great way to get discovered by new audiences too. Publish your reels right away, or schedule them in advance for a specific day and time.

Before you begin

Make sure you’ve already added an Instagram account to Hootsuite. To publish reels, you need to have an Instagram Business profile connected to a Facebook Page. For more details, see Add an Instagram account.

Open the post composer

You can start your post from Composer or Planner. Select one of the following options:

• Select Composer, and then select Post.
  
• Go to your content calendar in Planner , select the week view , select a time or recommended time to schedule your post, and then select Post. Learn about scheduling posts in a content calendar.

Create your reel

To get started, open the post composer, and then follow the steps in this article to create your post. Video editing is not supported in Hootsuite, so prepare your video file using another video editing program to trim, or add filters, stickers, or music. It’s also not currently possible to access Instagram music in Hootsuite.

1. Select one or more Instagram Business profiles you'd like to publish to.
2. Select Reel as your content type. Reel is not available if you have any Personal Instagram profiles selected.
   
3. Create your caption and proofread your text using Grammarly. The character limit for Instagram captions is 2,200. You can include the following in your caption:
   • Up to 30 hashtags - Select AI hashtag suggestions for a list of hashtag suggestions. The suggestions are powered by AI and are based on your post text and media (for hashtag best practices, see our Instagram hashtag guide).
   • Emoji - Select the smiley face to add emoji (check out Add more inclusive emoji).
   • Mentions - To mention someone, enter @ followed by their exact username. Mentions remain in plain text until the reel is published. To learn more, see Mention a user or Page.
4. Drag your video file from your computer into the Content area or choose Upload media . You can upload one video per reel. Maximum file size is 1 GB, and reels must be between 3 seconds and 15 minutes long. Your reels must have an aspect ratio of 9:16 to be shown on the Reels page in Instagram. See more Instagram video requirements.
5. To customize your video cover image, point to it and select Video settings. You can do the following in video settings:
   • View the video file's properties.
   • Customize the cover image for your reel. Select one of the options provided, or select Add custom cover to add your own.
6. Business and Enterprise plans (optional): Select Add next to Tags to add tags to your reel that you can use to analyze its performance in Hootsuite Analytics. To find out more, see Add tags to track your outbound posts.
   
   Tip: Reels aren't distinctly identified in Analytics, so we recommend adding a tag to make it easy to find them later.
7. Business and Enterprise plans (optional): Select your organization, and then select Campaign to associate your reel with a current or future campaign. To find out more, see Create and manage content campaigns.
8. Select Post now or Schedule for later. Reels must use direct publishing. Reels are shared to the Reels tab in Instagram and to your own Instagram feed.
   
   Note: Instagram limits Business profiles to 25 posts or reels in any rolling 24-hour period with direct publishing from Hootsuite.

In Planner, you’ll find your reels identified by the reel icon . Select a reel in Planner to view its details and make any edits as necessary.

The Hootsuite mobile app does not currently support publishing or editing reels. However, you can see and delete scheduled reels in the Planner on the mobile app.