It is quite common for users to accidentally delete a post or a story while using Instagram, which is why the platform lets you recover deleted content quite easily. You can restore deleted videos and photos, IGTV videos, Instagram reels, Instagram stories, and stories from your Story Archive or Highlights. Remember that you can only recover deleted content within a certain period, after which it is permanently removed from the platform. To recover deleted posts, reels, and stories on Instagram, follow these steps.

  1. Open Instagram and tap on your profile icon on the bottom right.
  2. Tap on the hamburger menu that appears as three horizontal lines on the top right.
  1. Next, tap on 'Your Activity' under the 'How you use Instagram' section.
  2. Tap on the 'Recently deleted' option under the 'Removed and archived content' section.
  1. Now you will see all the stories, posts, and reels you have deleted. Posts, reels, and stories will show up in separate sections. Tap on the section which contains the content you want to restore and then on the content itself.
  2. Then tap on the three dots on the right and three options will appear at the bottom. Tap on the 'Restore' option to recover your deleted post, story, or reel.
  1. When you tap on the 'Restore' option, a confirmation message will appear. Tap on 'Restore' again.
  2. Before restoring the content, Instagram will ask you to verify your identity. It will send a confirmation code to your registered phone number or email address. Once you tap on the 'Next' button and confirm your identity, Instagram will restore the post, story, or reel.

Things to know

  • You can only restore deleted posts and reels that are less than 30 days old. For stories, the time limit is 24 hours, unless they are in your stories archive, after which they are permanently deleted.
  • If you wish to avoid the hassle of recovering deleted content, consider archiving the content you no longer wish to appear on the platform. This will simply make it so the post or story cannot be seen but can still be accessed without needing to be restored.
  • Restoring a post or a reel after deleting it from the archive will only restore it to your archive and not your main feed. You will have to unarchive it before it can appear on your profile.
  • When you restore a post, all associated hashtags, comments, and likes will also be restored. However, you may have to add the product and/or location tags to the content again.