Instagram users spend an average of 53 minutes a day scrolling down and swiping up their feed, Instagram Live, IGTV and Stories. It’s clear: if you have a brand and want to be successful on the platform, you need to create video content that is impossible to ignore. Luckily, with Instagram you can shoot videos directly with your smartphone and then upload them in minutes. There is only one problem: the Instagram video format. What video formats does Instagram support? Is your content the right size, shape and specification?

Brands and influencers are under pressure. Tech giant Cisco predicts 82% of web traffic will be video by 2020. And then Instagram introduced IGTV. No more excuses: if you want to increase followers on Instagram , you need to create and share high quality video content.

What is the best video format for Instagram? 

The best video format for Instagram is MP4. Your content should include these technical specifications:

• H.264 codec
• AAC audio
• Bitrate 3500 kbps
• Frame rate 30 fps (“frames per second”)
• Max video length: 60 seconds
• Maximum video width: 1080 px (pixels)
• Maximum video height: 920 pixels

You can use most professional video editing apps and software to export your videos to meet these specifications.

If you just want to convert your video to Instagram format, you can use one of the many free online tools.

With a Google search you will find plenty of them, but today we will take a look at two of these programs.

The first is Kapwing . On the site, it is described as a “modern image, GIF and video editor”.

It is an intuitive tool that allows you to convert your us mobile phone number database content to the best Instagram video format and do some basic editing work. You can cut, rotate, resize and add music or text. With this free video editing tool you can convert practically any type of digital file. It also has separate pages for each social platform, so just click on the corresponding entry to convert your content to the correct Instagram video format.

You can upload files with the upload option, enter the corresponding URL or import them directly from Dropbox or Google Drive.

Well: now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s move on to a little more technical information.

What are the best dimensions and aspect ratios for videos on Instagram?

Great question. Let’s start with the best specs for:

• IGTV video
• Instagram Stories
• Live video
• Instagram Reels

When uploading videos to Instagram, use an aspect ratio of 9:16:

You’ve probably noticed that this is the standard size of most smartphone screens.

The best size for Instagram videos is 1080px x 1920px.

In other words, to play the best quality, your video should be 1080 pixels wide and 1920 pixels high.

You can download this template and use it to create your Instagram videos:

To download the image, follow these instructions:

• MacBook: press “Control” and click on the image, then select “Save image as” to save it.
• PC: click on the image with the right button, then select “Save image as” to save it.

Now you know what the best video format is for IGTV, Instagram Stories , Instagram Reels, and Instagram Live.

Technical specifications for videos in the Instagram feed

Instagram supports various video sizes for posts in the feed. Specifically, the aspect ratio of your videos should be between 1.91: 1 and 4: 5.

These two extremes simply refer to the “portrait” and “landscape” options.

The best dimensions to upload a video to Instagram for these aspect ratios are 1080 x 608 pixels and 1080 x 1350 pixels.

As mentioned earlier, you can use any proportion between these two extremes.

For example, you could share a square video with an aspect ratio of 1: 1 and dimensions of 1080 x 1080 pixels.

That said, you have to keep in mind the user experience on Instagram.

Remember that the Instagram app doesn’t rotate on smartphones and, according to Wzowl , 87% of people prefer to use their phone vertically.

This means that every time you share a “widescreen” – that is, rectangular full screen – post on Instagram, it will appear in the same size as this The Rock video :

If your goal is to increase your engagement on Instagram , that’s not quite ideal.

Your best bet, if possible, is to create videos in portrait format, as they will fill a larger portion of your followers’ screen.

Compare the image above with the one below, taken from a Gymshark Instagram video : This will make the user feel much more engaged with your video content. Also consider that when IGTV or Instagram Live videos are viewed in the Instagram feed, they are cropped with an aspect ratio of 4: 5, which is the “portrait” option we talked about earlier. All in all, it is clear that smartphones are pushing us towards a future of vertical video.