Get an Instagram user profile by username · Instagram API
Return the canonical public Instagram profile for a username — display name, bio, follower and following counts, post count, verification status, and profile picture. Useful as the entry point for any account-level research.
Try it without an API key: Instagram highlights viewer, Instagram former username checker.
Using ChatGPT, Claude Code or another client? See the setup steps
curl https://api.unifapi.com/instagram/users/{username} \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $UNIFAPI_KEY"Parameters
- usernamepathrequired
- Instagram URL slug, e.g. `instagram`
This operation is part of the Instagram API in the social platforms category. It uses the same Bearer token, request tracing, error model, and billing envelope as every UnifAPI endpoint, so agents can switch between platforms without custom per-vendor glue code.
Use it when a workflow needs Instagram public data alongside other social networks, but should still keep one API key, one account balance, and one predictable JSON contract.
Common agent workflows
- Resolve a public Instagram identity into structured profile metadata for enrichment agents.
- Refresh creator, company, or account snapshots without managing source-specific response shapes.
- Give an AI agent a stable Instagram data source without building a per-platform integration.
- Normalize Instagram responses into the same UnifAPI envelope used across the catalog.
Unified envelope, platform-native fields
- Lookup responses return one canonical object in `data` with stable identifiers, source URLs where available, and platform-specific metadata normalized into predictable JSON.
- The operation has a 3 credits ($0.003) minimum charge, so `billing.records_charged` can be higher than the visible records returned.
- A not-found or invalid-input condition uses the unified UnifAPI error shape, so callers do not need special handling for each source platform.
Response status codes
Billing
This operation charges 1 credit per billable record, with a 3 credits ($0.003) operation minimum. Public responses include billing metadata with credits charged, records charged, and remaining workspace balance. Incorrect Credit deductions caused by platform failures can be restored as billing corrections.
Errors and retries
Authentication, validation, rate-limit, not-found, and provider errors use the unified UnifAPI error format. Agents should log `request_id`, retry only retryable failures, and treat invalid API keys, disabled keys, and expired keys as the same public `unauthorized` error type.
Fields in the data object
A successful Get an Instagram user profile by username call returns one data object with these fields.
- idstring
- Instagram URL slug (`username`). Path parameter for every /instagram/users/{id}/... endpoint.
- user_idstring
- usernamestring
- full_namestring
- is_verifiedboolean
- is_privateboolean
- profile_pic_urlstring
- follower_countnumber
- following_countnumber
- media_countnumber
- fbid_v2string | null
- Cross-platform Facebook id, when present.
Agents & Skills built on Instagram
You rarely call Get an Instagram user profile by username by hand. These prebuilt agents and skills already read Instagram data inside Claude or Codex — start from one of them, or call this endpoint yourself.
Try it free in the browser
Instagram highlights viewer
See every story highlight pinned on any public Instagram profile — titles and covers in one list.
Instagram former username checker
See how many times a public Instagram account changed its username, when it joined, and where it's based.
Social media handle availability checker
Check a username across every social platform in one shot.
Instagram profile analyzer
Follower count, engagement rate, top posts and content patterns for any Instagram profile.
More Instagram operations
Combine endpoints from the same platform, then join the results with other UnifAPI categories without changing authentication or response parsing.
List posts for an Instagram topic
Returns posts and Reels that Instagram groups under a topic such as `harry potter`. Paginate with `cursor`.
Audit an Instagram account's engagement
Returns an engagement audit of a public Instagram account from its recent posts: engagement rate, average likes and comments, best and worst posts, content segments and outliers. Returns `not_found` when the account does not exist or is private.
List followers of an Instagram user
Return the accounts that follow a given Instagram user, by username, as a paginated list of profiles. Useful for audience analysis and mapping a creator's or brand's following.
List accounts an Instagram user follows
Return the accounts a given Instagram user follows, by username, as a paginated list of profiles. Useful for mapping an account's interest graph and the people it engages with.
Count an Instagram user's former usernames
Return how many times an Instagram account has changed its username, with the month it joined and the country it is based in, from Instagram's About this account information. Instagram shows the count only, not the former usernames or the dates they changed. Useful for identity verification and spotting rebrands.
List Instagram highlight reels for a user (metadata only)
Return the metadata for an Instagram user's highlight reels (titles and covers); the stories inside each highlight are not included. Useful for cataloging a profile's pinned highlights.