Music pairs well with almost every Instagram story, but adding a specific song or soundtrack isn’t the most obvious task if you’ve never tried it before or haven’t done it in a long time.
Instagram Stories has been supporting embedded music since 2018, but a few things have changed over the years. First, you used to be able to select a song from the Instagram music database before taking a video with the Story camera. Thus, you could react in the video to the playing music.
There are now two official ways to add music to your story, as well as at least one unofficial way, all of which are discussed below. Before proceeding, make sure you have the latest version of Instagram installed on your iPhone (App Store link) or Android phone (Google Play link) so you have all the latest features.
Select a song from the music sticker.
To add a song from the Instagram music database, which contains thousands of popular tracks, upload or take a photo or video in the Story camera. Once downloaded, tap the sticker icon in the tool list and select “MUSIC”in the sticker drawer to access a selection of songs.
You’ll see music recommendations under the For You tab, but you can also open the Browse tab to search other categories, or use the search bar to find a specific song. If no results come up after searching, the track is not available in the Instagram song catalog.
To preview a song, click the play button next to it. Click on the song title when you are satisfied. A clip preview of the track will load, and you can swipe on the timeline at the bottom to select a different part of the song. To shorten a clip, which defaults to a maximum of 15 seconds, tap the time icon and select a shorter period.
Selecting one of the lyric options AA, Aa, or A will display the lyrics differently in the clip. Two rectangle and line icons let you choose between a small or large sticker that includes album art, song title, and artist name. You can also tap on a sticker or lyrics on the screen to navigate through the layouts.
To change the font color or field background color, tap the color wheel at the top until you find the color you want.
When your sticker is ready, click “Done”at the top to add it to your photo or video. You can click on the sticker at any time to edit the clip again. And just like any other sticker, you can resize it and move it anywhere you like.
If you want to select a different song, open the clip editor and tap the album art icon next to the color wheel. To remove a sticker, touch and hold it, then drag it down and drop it into the trash can that appears.
Not all songs will have lyrics available. If your choice doesn’t fit, you can only choose a small or large sticker with cover art, song title and artist.
Share a song from a music service
If you want to show only the song you like, you can share it on your Instagram story. When you do so, a sticker with the album art, artist, and song title will appear over the auto-generated background, along with the service you shared the track from. You can also share an album, which shows the artist and album art, and an artist, which shows the artist’s name and photo.
Various services are supported, including but not limited to Apple Music, Deezer, Pandora, SoundCloud, Spotify, Tidal, and YouTube Music.
While the song will play immediately to your audience using option 1 above, posting music to Instagram will only show the card and the viewer needs to click on it to view that song on the service you used. This is a huge difference depending on the effect you want to have on your audience.
Unfortunately, you cannot share tracks stored locally on your device, only music from streaming services. For example, from the Music app on iPhone, you can share a song from the Apple Music service, but not from your library if that song doesn’t match a song in Apple Music.
Share a track, album, or artist from a music service as you normally would, and select “Instagram”or “Instagram Stories”from the sharing options. Ignore other options like “Instagram Chats”which will send music in a direct message.
If you don’t see “Instagram”or “Instagram Stories”as a sharing option, you may need to add it. For example, on an iPhone, swipe to the end of the sharing extension and tap More. You can click “Instagram”from there to share it, or click “Edit”and add “Instagram”to the main list of sharing extensions for easier access later.
As seen above, the song, album, or artist you share will open as a card in your Story camera; You can resize and move it anywhere you want, just like any other sticker.
Record video with background music
Apart from the above two options, you can also embed music in the video you record for your story. Just make sure the song is playing in the background before you shoot the video. You can capture Story Camera video directly or upload a video captured with another camera app. If you want people to know the song and artist, add them manually as text on the screen.