Instagram's hashtag limit: five per post

Last updated October 17, 2026

Instagram allows five hashtags in the caption of a post or a reel. It announced the cap on December 18, 2025; before that the limit was 30. This page sets out what Instagram has said, what it has left open and who says what about those parts, how many hashtags the other networks take, and how to choose your five. Every claim links to its source.

The short answer

The limit: 5 hashtags per post or reel since December 2025. It was 30.
From scheduling apps: Meta's developer docs still say 30, and Instagram hasn't said whether posts sent that way are held to 5.
Not settled: whether hashtags in comments count, whether Stories have a limit, and exactly what the app does at the sixth tag. Instagram hasn't said; the sections below show who says what.
What to use: five specific tags that name what the post shows. Instagram says generic ones like #reels and #explore can hurt.

What changed, and when

February 2024. Some accounts saw a pop-up limiting them to five hashtags. Instagram told Social Media Today it was a glitch. (Social Media Today)
November 2024. Instagram began removing the option to follow a hashtag, telling Social Media Today: “You will still be able to use hashtags in your posts and search with a hashtag to discover related posts.” (Social Media Today)
November 2025. Some accounts were held to a lower limit, with this message in the caption field: “You can only add 3 hashtags to your caption.” (PiunikaWeb)
December 18, 2025. Instagram announced five per post or reel, rolling out gradually. (Instagram)
March 2026. A creator interviewed by Social Media Examiner said her account was still held to three, so the rollout has not reached everyone the same way. (Social Media Examiner)

As of October 3, 2026, we found no newer announcement, and Meta's developer documentation for posting through the API still says 30 (Meta).

What Instagram said

The announcement came from Instagram's @creators account on Threads, under the headline “Starting today, Instagram will allow up to 5 hashtags in a reel or post.” Its statement:

“Instagram will gradually update the number of hashtags that you can include in a caption for a reel or post to 5. We find that using fewer (up to 5), more targeted hashtags rather than many generic ones can improve both your content's performance and people's experience on Instagram.”

The post's second slide, Instagram (@creators) on Threads, Dec 18, 2025 — the announcement

With it came two pieces of advice (as quoted by BetaNews):

“Be intentional with the hashtags you include and focus on ones that are relevant to the content you're publishing.”
“Don't spam your caption with too many irrelevant or generic hashtags, like #reels or #explore. Those types of hashtags don't actually help your content appear in places like Explore and could, in fact, hurt your content's performance.”

Adam Mosseri, who runs Instagram, put it more plainly in his broadcast channel: “While I know it can be tempting to use more, a few specific tags actually perform better than a long list of generic ones.” (Inc.)

What counts toward the five

Posts, reels and carousels: yes

Instagram's announcement covers “a caption for a reel or post”. A carousel is a post with one caption for the whole set, so the same five apply.

Hashtags in comments: Instagram hasn't said clearly

The announcement talks about captions. Instagram's Help Center says where tags can go: “You can add hashtags in the caption or comments of your post.” And then: “You can use up to 5 tags on a post. If you include more than 5 tags on a single photo/video, your comment won't post.” That refuses a comment that brings too many tags, but it doesn't say whether the tags in your caption and your comments are counted together. The scheduling tools read it differently:

Do hashtags in comments count toward Instagram's limit? Who says what
Who	What they say
Instagram's announcement	“a caption for a reel or post”
Instagram's Help Center	“If you include more than 5 tags on a single photo/video, your comment won't post.”
Buffer's Help Center	“Instagram allows up to 5 hashtags in the caption and up to 30 hashtags in the first comment.”
Later	“The 5-hashtag limit applies regardless of whether hashtags are in your caption or comments”

Instagram hasn't settled it. The reading that is safe under every version: keep the total on a post, caption and comments together, at five or fewer.

Stories: nothing published

The announcement covers posts and reels. Neither it nor Instagram's Help Center page on hashtags mentions Stories.

At the sixth hashtag

Instagram hasn't described what the app does. When some accounts were tested on a lower limit in November 2025, the caption field said “You can only add 3 hashtags to your caption.” (PiunikaWeb). For the five-tag cap, the reports differ:

What happens at Instagram's sixth hashtag? Who says what
Who	What they say
RecurPost, on the app	“the composer blocks a 6th tag before you can publish”
Instagram's Help Center	“your comment won't post”
Later	“Instagram will either block publishing or remove the excess tags.”

Posts from scheduling apps

Apps that schedule posts and publish them for you send them through Instagram's API, which has its own rulebook. On October 3, 2026, Meta's developer docs for it still said 30. Instagram hasn't said whether those posts are held to 5, and the scheduling services disagree:

Does Instagram's API still take 30 hashtags? Who says what
Who	What they say
Meta's developer docs	“Maximum 2200 characters, 30 hashtags, and 20 @ tags.”
RecurPost, which posts through the API	“Instagram's official API, which still accepts up to 30 hashtags”
Ayrshare's API docs	“The post text may contain up to 5 hashtags”
Buffer's Help Center	“if you add a 6th hashtag to the caption, or a 31st to the first comment, you'll see an error before you can save the post.”

Postango sends 5 at most to Instagram, which is inside every reading.

What Postango does with hashtags

Postango, which publishes this guide, writes a caption and hashtags for every video it edits and posts them through each network's API, so it lives by these rules every day. Here is what its code does:

Five at most in the captions it writes, on every network. Your own tags, typed once in the “Hashtags on every post” field (Settings › Presets), go first. Postango then adds tags written for that video until the caption has five in all, unless you switch them off; with none of your own, it adds 3 to 5. Each one is meant to name something in the video, in your notes about it, or your business. Postango's caption writer is told never to use a tag that only asks for reach, like #fyp, #viral or #trending.
Told before, not after. Type more than five and the field names the ones that will go out and the ones that will be dropped, before anything posts.
Fewer where a network wants fewer. At the moment it posts, each network gets its own count (the table below). Your own tags go first wherever there is room for them all. Where a network keeps fewer than the caption has (one on Threads; two on X and Bluesky; three on YouTube and LinkedIn), the tags written for the video keep their places first and your own are the first left off, because a tag naming the subject is the one a stranger searches for.
Nothing in the comments. Postango puts hashtags in the caption and posts no comments on Instagram, so the captions it writes stay at 5 or fewer under any reading of the rule.
Your own caption. If you write the caption yourself on the review card (Content › Needs review on the website, Content › Needs review in the app), where you approve each video, Postango adds no hashtags to it. When it posts, it cuts a last line made only of hashtags down to each network's count in the table below, except on Facebook, where nothing is cut. Hashtags inside a sentence are never cut, so keep those to five yourself.

How many hashtags each network takes

Each network's own published rule, from its documentation, and how many hashtags Postango puts on a post there.

Hashtag rules by network, and how many Postango posts
Network	The network's own rule	What Postango posts
Instagram	5 — Instagram began capping posts at five in December 2025. Its developer docs still say 30	5 at most
Facebook	No limit published	5 at most in a caption Postango writes; none cut from a caption you write
YouTube	More than 60 and YouTube ignores all of them	3 at most
TikTok	No separate limit; they count toward the caption	5 at most
X	No limit; X recommends no more than 2	2 at most
LinkedIn	No limit published	3 at most
Pinterest	No limit published	5 at most
Threads	One topic tag per post	1 at most

Swipe the table sideways to see every column.

Bluesky has no row because Postango posts photos there, not video; it keeps two hashtags on those.

YouTube says “up to three hashtags that are considered most engaging will appear by your video title” (YouTube Help), and Postango keeps three there.

Each rule's source, and the same networks' length, file size and caption limits, are on the social media video limits page.

How to pick your five

Instagram's advice is to be specific: “Be intentional with the hashtags you include and focus on ones that are relevant to the content you're publishing.” For a small business or a maker posting their own work, five tags go a long way when each one does a different job. An order to start from:

What the piece is, in the words a buyer would type: #cremationurn, #walnutbowl, #kitchenremodel.
What it is made of, or how: #curlymaple, #laserengraving, #dovetails.
The craft or trade, where people who follow that kind of work look: #woodworking, #tilework.
Where you are, if you sell locally and people near you use a tag for your town or region.
Your shop's name, if customers use it to find your posts.

For a video of a curly maple urn getting its oil finish, that could be #cremationurn #curlymaple #woodfinishing #woodworking and the shop's own tag.

Leave out tags that describe nothing in the post; Instagram's own advice, quoted above, names #reels and #explore as the kind that can hurt. Before you settle on a tag, search for it on Instagram and look at what comes up: if the top posts look nothing like your work, it probably isn't where your customers look.

Old captions and saved hashtag sets

Posts from before the cap. Instagram hasn't said anything about them, and we found no report of old posts being changed or hidden for carrying more than five. It hasn't said whether editing one is held to the new limit either; if the app won't save an edit, count the hashtags first.
Saved sets in a notes app, a spreadsheet or a scheduling tool: cut each to five, using the order above. Some tools still let you put far more in a first comment; whether Instagram counts those is the open question above.
In Postango, the “Hashtags on every post” field keeps the first five you type and names any it will drop. Videos already in the queue need nothing: when a caption ends in a line of hashtags, Instagram gets 5 of them at most.

Questions

How many hashtags can you use on Instagram?+

Five on a post or a reel, since December 18, 2025. Before that it was 30.

How many hashtags should I use on Instagram?+

Up to five, each one specific to what the post shows. Instagram's own words: “We find that using fewer (up to 5), more targeted hashtags rather than many generic ones can improve both your content's performance and people's experience on Instagram.” Postango writes 3 to 5 for each video.

Do hashtags in the comments count toward the limit?+

Instagram hasn't said clearly, and the guides that answer disagree (who says what). Keep the total on a post at five, caption and comments together, and it doesn't matter who is right.

How do you add hashtags to an Instagram reel?+

In the caption, as you would on any post. From Instagram's Help Center: “Click Write a caption... and type # followed by text or emoji (example: #flower).” Up to five on a reel.

How long can a hashtag be?+

Instagram gives no length limit for a single hashtag, only rules for what it can contain. Its Help Center: “Numbers are allowed in hashtags. However, spaces and special characters, like $ or %, won't work.” The ceiling is the caption's: 2,200 characters.

Is the limit the same for Reels and carousels?+

Yes. Instagram's announcement covers "a caption for a reel or post", and a carousel is a post with one caption.

Do hashtags still help on Instagram?+

Less than they used to. Adam Mosseri, who runs Instagram, in May 2024: “While hashtags can help people interested in specific topics find your content, they won't necessarily increase your content's visibility.” And with the cap: “While I know it can be tempting to use more, a few specific tags actually perform better than a long list of generic ones.” (Inc.)

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Sources

Instagram's Threads post and Help Center read on October 6, 2026; everything else on October 3, 2026.