So what is the best time to post on Instagram In India or from any other country? Is there is a generic answer? I would say no but you can find out the best time for you to post content on Instagram so that you get maximum reach and increase your engagement.
Social media are no more only entertainment, rather these have now become a livelihood for many content creators. In the past decade, many have earned a living out of these platforms and many are now aspiring to repeat the success of their predecessors.
Every social media platform has the best posting time and it defers with the kind of audience you are targeting, countries, cities, or niche.
As per statistics, India has 145.46 Million active users on Instagram which is projected to increase up to 319.41 Million by 2025.
So it is meant to say that Instagram has a lot of potential and with the help of this you can promote your brand or do self-promotion or even you can earn money from it.
Like every social media, Instagram also has some tricks like what to post, when to post, and which hashtags to use. If you do not follow these small things, then you will not be able to see the growth that you hope for.
So what is the best time to post on Instagram in India
I will not only share statistics with you in this post, but I will tell everyone all the findings of the one-month-long experiment. I had opened an Instagram account for this experiment on how to increase followers on Instagram and So let’s discuss what is the best time to post on Instagram in India.
Best time to post on Instagram
According to Sprout Social, the best to post on Instagram is Tuesday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. They found out that users are most active on weekdays in comparison to weekends.
According to them the worst day to post is on Sunday.
According to Hubspot, the best time to post is Wednesday at 6:00 AM and 9:00 to 10:00 AM and Friday from 7:00 AM to 10:00 AM. while the most consistent time for engagement is from Tuesday evening to Wednesday afternoon.
According to Hubspot, Sunday is the worst day to post as most of the users are inactive.
My Findings
Posting time on Instagram depends on three main things like the city your audience belongs to, what works, and whether it belongs to this group. These three things depend on your niche.
For example, if you have a cooking niche, then most of your audience will be women. And if you are more into the healthy cooking niche then a measure chunk of your audience will be women from urban areas.
Let us talk about another example. Suppose you have an Instagram account and your motivational quote is below. So in such a situation, your best time to post will be in the morning i.e. from 8:00 to 11:00. Because this is the time when people look for some motivational quotes to motivate themselves before starting the day.
Let’s talk about an experimental project done by me, which I started last month. I have this Instagram account in the Entertainment niche. You can see my daily engagement level in the two different photos given below.
Picture-1: In this photo, you can see the engagement report for the first 5 days of the week. My best engagement is on Friday while the second-best day is Thursday and the worst day is Tuesday.
If we talk about the time, then the best time has been between 6:00 and 9:00 in the evening. Whereas the worst time has been between 3:00 am to 6:00 am.
Picture-2: In this second image you can see that on the weekend i.e. on Saturday and Sunday, although the engagement level decreases slightly from Friday or Monday, it is still better than Tuesday. And if we talk about the best time, then there is no change in time. At the same time, 6:00 to 9:00 in the evening is the best time to post while 3:00 in the night to 6:00 in the morning is the worst time to post.
If we talk about 7 days now, then according to my niche or anyone who is associated with things like entertainment movies, the best day for them is Friday and then Thursday. And if we talk about the worst day then it is Tuesday and then Saturday.
So what is the Audience base of this account
So if we talk about our audience then you can see that most of my audience is from big cities of India. On the other hand, if we talk about age, then you can see that almost eighty percent of my audience is between the age of 18 to 44. That is, most of the audience is those who either study or have a job.
So for this reason you can see that most of my engagement has happened either between 12:00 to 3:00 in the afternoon or between 6:00 and 9:00 in the evening.
From 12:00 to 3:00 in the afternoon, as you know, there is lunchtime when a person is in a relaxed mood after having his food. Then he spends most of his time on his social media or his messaging app from his smartphone.
Similarly, from 6:00 to 9:00 in the evening, most people return from their work. Sitting in a bus, train, or auto, most people spend time on their social media and give their perspective on the events of the day.
So what is the best time to post on Instagram In India
So is there a common best time to post on Instagram in India?
There is no common time for all niches to post on Instagram but it heavily depends upon the user base. If you are in a health niche then your maximum audience will be from big cities and mostly working professionals. So you can analyze their free time or the time they tend to relax with their smartphones.
An Instagram post has an active life of 4 hours. That means it will almost die after 4 hours unless it has gone viral.
How to determine best time to post on Instagram in India
Follow the below steps to know your best time to post on Instagram India.
- Convert your account to a business account from personal.
- Prepare 12 posts every day for 14 days.
- Now start posting every hour of the week with appropriate hashtags.
- After 14 days, go to your profile and press Insights.
- Then go to the ‘Your Audience’ section.
- At the bottom of the section, you will find the ‘Most Active Times’.
- Now you will find every day’s report.
- Here you will find the best time to post on Instagram in India.
Wrapping Up best time to post on Instagram in India
So here is the process to find out the best time to post on Instagram in India. You can follow the prescribed time but run an experiment for your account to determine the best time.