How to export your Instagram followers and following

You can request a copy of your Instagram information through Meta’s Accounts Center. For a relationship report, choose the Instagram account you want to analyze and export your followers and following information in JSON format.

The Reports web analyzer uses this copy. It does not sign in to Instagram or fetch live account information.

Choose the right information

Open Instagram’s settings and find Accounts Center. In Your information and permissions, look for the option to export or download your information. Labels can change between app versions and regions; Meta’s export guide is the reference for the current flow.

Select your Instagram profile, then the option to export information to your device. If you can choose specific information, select the category that contains your followers and following. For the full report, also include the activity, message, and insights categories you want to analyze. Relationship-only analysis does not need them. Media binaries are skipped by the analyzer.

Choose JSON, not HTML. Select the broadest available date range for relationship information. A narrow range can omit records; a list difference is only useful when both lists are complete.

Download and keep the original archive

When Instagram makes the export available, download it to a location you can find again. On an iPhone or iPad, keep it in the Files app. On a computer, keep it in a local folder.

Do not combine archives from different accounts or different export dates. The web analyzer cannot reliably detect account ownership from relationship files alone.

Find the relationship files

An export commonly includes a folder named connections/followers_and_following. Look for:

• followers_1.json, plus any additional numbered follower files.
• following.json.

Reports locates this directory inside the ZIP, including inside an enclosing export folder. It excludes Threads files with the same basenames. Keep every follower part together: selecting only the first part can produce an incomplete comparison.

Open your report

Go to the free Instagram analyzer and choose either the ZIP archive or all the relationship JSON files from that export.

The tool reads supported JSON in your browser. In addition to relationship lists, a full ZIP can supply interaction rankings, content counts, post performance, audience insights, posting times, and hashtags. Each section shows whether its required data is available. Lists and rankings preview five entries. Full lists are available in the iOS app with an in-app subscription.

If you move to the app, keep the original file: the website does not upload it or transfer it through the App Store.

What if the export is too large?

The web preview accepts up to 100 MB of selected files, with separate limits on extracted JSON data. A ZIP containing years of media can exceed that limit even when the relationship files are small.

Extract the archive on your device and select only the relationship JSON files. Alternatively, request an export containing only the information required for this task.

What the report does not establish

An export is a snapshot, not a live connection. One snapshot does not establish when someone unfollowed you, who blocked you, or who viewed your profile. Read how Reports interprets your data before drawing conclusions.