Instagram Post From Firefox
Without any app Post photos to Instagram from PC or Laptop
HomeHow ToWithout any app Post photos to Instagram from PC or Laptop
Last Updated: March 7, 2021
How To
Can you post photos on Instagram without the app from a Windows 10, macOS, or Linux Desktop PC or Laptop? Of course Yes, it is possible just using any Browser, here we let you know how to upload Instagram pictures from your PC.
Instagram doesn’t need any introduction at all. It is a popular platform that is meant to publish photos and short videos online using its app. Yes, it is primarily designed as a mobile application and restricts uses to upload content from smartphones and one should only use that as well. However, that doesn’t work for everyone. If you are a professional user who wants to edit photos on Windows, Linux, or macOS using some tools, for example, Lightroom on Windows. Or maybe you want to upload photos or videos that you didn’t take with your smartphone camera. Or perhaps you would like to use the Keyboard of a PC or laptop to write long captions and hashtags for your pictures, the reason could be anything, the main thing is the solution to this. And that is so simple, using any PC browser such as Microsoft Edge, Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari, or Vivaldi we can post videos or photos to Instagram.
How to Post on Instagram using Google Chrome or Firefox
Quick start guide
To post photos, first open the website on any PC browser you are using, it could be Chrome, Firefox, or others
Enter your credentials and sign in to your Instagram account.
Open Inspect tool, for that use the shortcut key combination [Ctrl] + [Shift] + [I]. Or you can click the three-dot menu in the upper right corner, select More Tools ⇒ Developer tools on Chrome. For Firefox burger icon ⇒ Web Developer ⇒ Inspector.
Now click on the Toggle button above to switch to other devices.
You can then select the desired device in the ” Responsive ” drop-down menu.
Refresh or Reload Instagram website.
Now, you see + icon, click that to upload photos and videos to post on Instagram via PC browser.
To change the view again, simply click the button above to switch the interface again.
Step by step instructions with screenshots
1. To post, open Instagram on PC or Laptop
Whatever PC or laptop you would have, the most common thing is the browser. Generally, we all either using Chrome or Firefox, if you are using any other then you can open that. Now, visit the web page.
2. log in to Instagram on Windows, Linux, or macOS
To post on Instagram directly from a PC or laptop, we open the web page of this platform on our system using the browser, the first thing it will ask is to log in to the account you have created with Instagram. Thus, simply enter the username and password then click on the login button.
3. Open Browser Code Inspect Developer tool
At this time, most of the available browsers come with some inbuilt tools to help web developers in finding out whether their coded website is working fine and how it looks on different devices. And out of the couple tools, one is Code Inspector. It can be accessed from the settings, however, the exact location could be different according to the browser you are using. Nevertheless, the keyboard shortcut to open it would be the same for all of them i. e Ctrl+Alt+I. So, simply press these keys on your keyboard. Alternatively, we can directly right-click on any web page, here it is Instagram, and select the “Inspect” option.
4. Select Toggle Device Toolbar
To change the Device for viewing the webpage, click on the Toggle Device Toolbar icon that. As we click it, the browser will immediately change the size of the webpage.
5. Use some mobile model as a device
Now, on the web page window, you will see a drop-down box with “Responsive“, selected by default, click on it and select any smartphone model available on the list. You can also select Edit and add more device models to view and post pictures on Instagram. Here we are using Google Chrome and Galaxy S5 as our Device platform.
6. Reload Instagram Web page on Chrome or Firefox
Everything is set now, however, one last thing we have to perform to get the Image upload option so that we can post on Instagram directly from our PC or laptop web browser. For that, click on the web page Reload button.
7. Post Images to Instagram from Desktop PC
Now, you will see a + icon to upload and post images on your Instagram directly from your PC or Laptop. Click on that and select the photo available on your computer.
8. Edit or apply filters
Video Tutorial
How to Post to Instagram with a Web Browser by User Agent Spoofing
UPDATE: Instagram has recently added a new feature to the the website that renders this spoofing technique unnecessary. You can now post directly to Instagram from a desktop or laptop computer without resorting to tricks or apps.
Instagram is designed primarily as a service to be used with mobile devices. But there are all sorts of reasons you might want to post photos from a desktop or laptop computer rather than a phone. You can, of course, send the photo from your computer to your phone and upload it from there, but that gets cumbersome pretty quickly.
There are, however, ways to post directly from a computer, and I’ve been putting together a series of guides for several good methods. Some use third-party apps and services. Some use emulators. This is a guide on how to use a regular web browser like Chrome or Safari without needing to buy a separate app or install a browser plugin.
Using Instagram with a Desktop Web Browser
You can access the Instagram website with a regular web browser on a desktop or laptop, but as you’ve no doubt already found, it’s a stripped-down version.
When you’re logged into your account through the website on a desktop browser, you can view photos, like photos, and even comment on photos, but one thing you can’t do is post new photos. There’s no way to upload them—the usual camera icon isn’t there, like this:
But there’s a way to alter the behavior of your browser to make Instagram think that you’re accessing it through a mobile device. It’s taking advantage of two things. The first is that Instagram now has a special version it shows to mobile devices that includes the upload function. The second is that you can convince the Instagram site that you’re accessing it from a mobile device, even if you’re using a desktop web browser. It’s using what’s known as user agent emulation or user agent spoofing (sometimes just UA spoofing). When you access the site with this method, it looks very similar to the regular version you see in a web browser, but you’ll notice that it now includes the camera icon for creating new posts:
I’ve put together guides on how to do it with the major browsers; they’re below.
But first, it’s worth explaining that this isn’t some black-hat, frowned-upon process like spoofing phone numbers is for phone spam. Spoofing a user agent is a perfectly legitimate and standard tool for testing websites. That’s why it’s built into the browser developer tools. So you’re not doing something you shouldn’t by doing this.
Limitations
Before we get to the how-tos for specific browsers, it’s worth mentioning some limitations of this method.
This method emulates a mobile device accessing the Instagram website. It is not the same thing as using something like Bluestacks to emulate running the Instagram app.
That’s important because not every feature of the Instagram app is available through the Instagram mobile website. You can upload a photo and add a caption, but there are some basic Instagram features that aren’t available through the web interface.
Filters. You don’t have the option to apply filters.
Multi-photo posts. Instagram recently added the option to include multiple images or videos in a single post. That’s not available through the website—you can only upload one image at a time to create a single post.
In-photo tagging. You can still tag someone in the comment section, but you can’t tag someone within the photo.
Editing captions after publishing. To edit a post’s caption after it has been published, you’ll still need to use the mobile app.
User Agent Spoofing with Instagram
Basically, the user agent is a piece of code that the browser sends to the website to tell it information about the browser and operating system you’re using. The website can then show a display version of the website designed for that device’s layout.
If you have your own website and have used something like Google Analytics to track what browsers your site’s visitors are using, that’s where that information comes from. In case you’re interested, here’s an example of some of the information that’s sent to websites I might visit when using Chrome on a Mac:
Mozilla/5. 0 (Macintosh; Intel macOS 10_12_5) AppleWebKit/537. 36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/58. 0. 3029. 81 Safari/537. 36
The method used here changes that information to match a browser on an iOS or Android device. And that, in turn, tells the Instagram site to display its new mobile version.
Modern browsers have a way to test what a site looks like with different devices and browsers. It’s designed mainly to be able to test responsive designs to see how they look on mobile devices. And it’s a feature that can be used here to make the Instagram website think that we’re accessing it through a mobile device rather than a desktop browser.
I’ll go through it with some of the major browsers below. I’m doing it on Mac; Windows versions are very similar.
For all of these, log in to your Instagram account through the web browser first (technically, it doesn’t matter whether you’re logged in first or not; it just simplifies these guides if you are).
Posting to Instagram with Chrome
Go to View > Developer > Developer Tools.
That’s going to open the Developer Tools panel. Depending on the layout of your screen and browser, it might pop up in a separate tab or might be at the bottom of your active tab. It doesn’t matter which.
You’ll see a lot of code, menus, and tabs. For this, you can safely ignore nearly all of it. Look for the small icon at the top left that shows a phone and tablet (yes, that’s what those are…. ).
Click on it. The browser window will now transform to the dimensions of a specific smartphone or tablet.
You can change what phone using the drop-down menu, although it really doesn’t matter too much which preset you use here so long as it’s a standard mobile device.
So it now looks just like the mobile app. And, importantly, you can now see the camera icon. So you can use it just like the mobile app—use the camera icon to create a new post by browsing for a new photo and uploading it.
If you’re using the privacy-centric browser Brave, this also works the same way because Brave is based on Chrome. As are some other smaller-circulation browsers.
Posting to Instagram with Safari
Go to Develop > User Agent > Safari – iOS 10 – iPhone.
If you don’t see the “Develop” option in the menu, you can enable it by going to Preferences > Advanced and checking the box at the bottom for “Show Develop menu in menu bar. ”
The page should refresh and show the camera icon at the top, like this:
Posting to Instagram with Firefox
Until recently, you needed to install a plugin to do this with Firefox, but that’s changed with recent versions. So make sure you’re using the latest version of Firefox first.
First, go to and log into your account.
From Firefox’s main menu, go to Tools > Web Developer > Responsive Design Mode. (You can also use a keyboard shortcut to toggle it. On Mac, it’s CMD+OPT+M. )
You should then see a small, responsive version of the site that includes the add photo button. (You might need to refresh the page. ) If you want to use a larger viewport, click on the bar at the top that says “no device selected” and choose a device with a larger screen).
Posting to Instagram with Microsoft Edge / Internet Explorer
Press F12 to open Developer Tools.
Find the Emulation tab and choose a mobile device from the list of options.
Other Browsers
The better modern browsers have some variation of this kind of development mode user agent emulation, but I haven’t tested it on every browser. I’m focusing mainly on the most common (thanks to user agents, I know that 92 percent of visitors to my site use either Chrome, Safari, or Firefox, with the remaining 8 percent split among various other browsers).
If it doesn’t work on your browser, Chrome is probably the simplest multi-OS option. Or if you’re using a Mac, Safari works just as well.
Troubleshooting
Some users report that it doesn’t work right away for them. In many cases, it’s a caching issue.
This is a running list of troubleshooting ideas that I’ll add to as users report issues with the upload/camera icon not becoming visible.
Can’t see the camera icon. If you’re using Firefox (or another browser not mentioned above), make sure you’re not using the Firefox function that only changes the display port. It’s a two-step process on Firefox, and you’ll need to change the user agent either with the manual method (link above) or a user agent spoofing plugin.
Can’t see the camera icon. After you’ve changed the user agent, refresh the page. I’ve found it usually does that itself, but it’s possible that it might have done that. It’s also potentially possible for browser caching to be showing you a non-refreshed version, so you could try clearing the browser cache and then reloading.
Don’t have the Develop menu in Safari. If you don’t see the “Develop” option in the menu, you can enable it by going to Preferences > Advanced and checking the box at the bottom for “Show Develop menu in menu bar. ”
How To Post On Instagram From PC or Mac (Desktop or Laptop) In 2021
Wondering how to post to Instagram from a PC or Mac computer? You’re in the right place…
To the dismay of people all over the world, Instagram does not allow us to upload photos or videos to our profiles from your desktop or laptop.
This is an intentional move from Instagram to encourage mobile use of the app and engagement with other users. However, for many photographers, influencers, and businesses whose content has been taken or filmed on a camera, the task of sending everything from desktop to phone to post manually can be very time-consuming!
Luckily, there are a few ways around this issue using third-party tools or clever desktop hacks. We’ve compiled lots of info from the web about how to post to Instagram from any computer, PC, or Mac, and put it into this handy guide!
How To Post On Instagram From Computer
There are 4 ways to use a laptop or desktop computer (PC or Mac) to post photos and videos on Instagram.
Scheduling Tools
Hopper HQ
Changing Browser User-Agent
Chrome
Safari
Third-Party Tools
Bluestacks
Deskgram
Uplet (Mac only)
Other
Facebook Creator Studio
Post On Instagram From PC or Mac With Scheduling Tools
The easiest way to post to Instagram from PC or Mac is with a scheduling tool. This offers similar features to the instant services detailed below, but also allows you to bulk upload and schedule your photos and videos to post in the future. Scheduling Instagram content saves heaps of time, and allows teams and individuals to be extra organized when planning what to post and when!
⭐ Check out our How To Schedule Instagram Posts guide here ⭐
Using Hopper HQ, you can post photos and videos to Instagram from your desktop with ease and can choose between sending them instantly or scheduling for the future. Here’s how it works:
When you make an account with Hopper HQ and log in to your dashboard, you are greeted with all of your current scheduled posts in the order they are going to publish. As well as this, with the Grid Planner you can see how all of your scheduled posts will look on your Instagram profile once they’ve been published, allowing you to easily plan a great feed aesthetic…
The Hopper HQ dashboard and grid planner allow you to plan and manage all your Instagram content in one place.
By clicking on ‘Create Posts’ in the top left corner, you are taken to a window where you are able to upload 50 photos or videos at once. To post to Instagram from PC or Mac with Hopper HQ, you’re able to upload files from your device, Dropbox, Google Drive, Google Photos, Box, URL or web search. This is very handy if you work collaboratively on cloud file sharing sites and want to post to Instagram from your desktop.
Bulk upload up to 50 photos and videos from multiple sources including Google Drive and Dropbox.
If your images are not the correct size for Instagram, you will see an alert and be taken to the photo editor. Here you can crop your photo with Hopper HQ’s easy pre-set dimensions for portrait and landscape photos, as well as apply any filters or edits.
Edit your posts for Instagram with Hopper HQ image editor.
Once you’ve made any edits, you can write captions for all of your uploads (including emojis) as well as the first comments for your hashtags. You then have the choice to ‘Post Now’, schedule a time, or save as a draft (a handy feature if you’re working in a team). If you decide you want to post the same photo to another Instagram account, or even a Facebook or Twitter page, you can easily add accounts to the right-hand side of the post using the plus icon.
Schedule your Instagram posts with captions and first comments in advance on Hopper HQ.
Now your photos and videos will appear in the dashboard! Any changes can be easily made by dragging and dropping, and the Instagram Grid Planner shows you an accurate view of what your feed will look like on Instagram once all your scheduled posts have been published.
Hopper HQ also has a calendar view to easily keep track of your posting consistency, as well as user-friendly Analytics to monitor the success of your content and inform you of your audience demographics!
The drag and drop calendar on Hopper HQ.
Plan your social media posts.
Visually plan your posts. Drag and drop everywhere.
Pricing:
Hopper HQ works on a subscription basis by the number of accounts, starting at:
1 Instagram + 1 Facebook account + 1 Twitter + 1 Linkedin for $19 monthly, or $16 monthly if paying annually
The more accounts you add, the cheaper the tool becomes.
Take a look at the pricing calculator to find out more!
Summary:
Hopper HQ does far more than post to your Instagram from a PC or Mac. It has been built to help people manage Instagram at scale, and is constantly adding more features to make the process even easier.
Try it out for yourself with a 14-day trial and start scheduling now!
Free
✅ Hashtag Tool
✅ Photo Posts
✅ First Comments
✅ Video Posts
✅ Editing Tools
✅Carousel Posts
✅ Filters
✅ Windows
✅ Cropping
✅ Mac
✅ Tag Images
✅ Bulk Upload
✅ Tag Locations
✅ Captions
✅ Multiple Accounts
✅ Feed Grid Preview
✅ Bulk Edit
Plan & schedule social media ahead of time.
Video, gallery & image posts
Calendar, feed & grid preview
Instagram, Facebook & Twitter
START PLANNING YOUR POSTS NOW
Change Browser User Agent To Post On Instagram From A Desktop or Laptop
This may sound complicated, but is probably one of the simplest ways to post to Instagram from PC or Mac. It requires no third-party site or download and is completely free. However, the method is very basic and does not work with video files or gallery posts.
In his in-depth guide, David Coleman explains that ‘the user agent is a piece of code that the browser sends to the website to tell it information about the browser and operating system you’re using’. Essentially, on the desktop version of Instagram, you can tell your browser that you’re viewing the site on a mobile, and then the ‘upload’ button that is usually unavailable will appear when you refresh! Here’s how to do it:
(Disclaimer: I’m using Mac so the screenshots will vary for Windows users, but all the same options should be there! )
How To Post on Instagram From Mac
Open the Developer Tools on your Chrome browser via the View menu…
Then the console will open. Click on this icon to change the user agent…
In this drop-down menu, select a mobile model from the list of devices. I chose iPhone 6/7/8…
This will change the view of the browser to a mobile screen and the upload button will appear. NOTE: if it does not appear straight away, navigate on to a different page and back, or simply refresh.
The upload button will automatically open your computer’s files…
Select a photo. You then have the option to rotate and also to zoom out if it’s a portrait or landscape image…
You have a range of the Instagram filters available, although not the editing tools. When you’re ready, press next as you would on mobile…
On the review page, you can add a caption and location, but are not able to tag accounts or share on other social networks. Click share and the post will be published on your profile!
In order to change the user agent on Safari, you must enable the ‘Develop’ menu by going to Safari > Preferences > Advanced and enabling the option ‘Show Develop menu in menu bar’.
Once this is done you can follow these steps…
Once the Develop menu has been added to your Safari navigation bar, hover over the User-Agent drop down and select the iPhone option…
This will cause the upload button to appear at the bottom of the browser…
Clicking upload will take you to your files…
Select a photo, add a filter, and click next…
Publish to your profile using the Share button in the top right-hand corner!
How To Upload To Instagram From PC
If you are running Chrome on a Windows computer, click on the ‘three dots’ icon on the top right section of your browser.
Click on ‘More tools’ and from the dropdown options, pick ‘Developer tools
Click on the “Toggle Device Toolbar” option in the console window. You can also press Ctrl+Shift+M
When you do this, you will see the device toolbar popup at the top of your browser window. Here, you can click on the dropdown to pick a mobile device user agent.
Once you have set the user-agent to a mobile device, launch Instagram on the browser. You should be able to see the Post button. Click this button to start posting photos or videos on Instagram from your desktop or laptop computer.
Whilst this is a simple and free solution to upload to Instagram from PC or Mac, there are many limitations. Despite the interface being almost identical to Instagram on mobile, it is missing all its editing tools and the ability to post multiple photos and videos. This is a handy quick fix if your photos are ready to go on your desktop or USB and you don’t have time to transfer them over to your phone!
✅ Free
Hashtag Tool
First Comments
Video Posts
Editing Tools
Carousel Posts
Cropping
Bulk Upload
Multiple Accounts
Feed Grid Preview
Bulk Edit
Use Third-Party Tools To Post On Instagram From Any Computer
The other way to post to Instagram from your PC or Mac is to use a third-party tool. These are programs you can download to your desktop or use online which post to your account for you. We took a look at the ones available online and have summarised them below:
Bluestacks is an Android emulator for your Mac or PC and offers a scaled-back version of the Instagram Android app, all you need is a Google account. This is the most similar method to the ones listed above, as it simply allows you to use the mobile app on the desktop without any additional features such as bulk upload or multiple account management. Here’s how it works:
Once you download Bluestacks on to your computer, you will need to upload your content into the Media Manager on the platform. Then simply search for Instagram using the search bar in the top right-hand corner of the App Center, and click Install.
Once in Bluestacks, install Instagram (Image source:)
2. Once you open Instagram, the platform interface will change to the dimensions and view of the android app, similar to changing the user agent on Chrome.
Image source: This is a good and simple way to post to Instagram from a PC or Mac. Instagram on Bluestacks works exactly the same way as it does on mobile (UPDATE: As of Sept 2018 Bluestacks no longer supports video). It is therefore a better alternative to changing the user agent on your browser, as you can edit posts, and share with other social networks. The downside to Bluestacks comes if you want to upload in bulk, share your posts to multiple accounts, or schedule in advance.
For an in-depth tutorial of how to post to Instagram from PC or Mac with Bluestacks, watch ZR3D’s Youtube guide from earlier this year.
✅ Carousel Posts
Download Bluestacks here.
Deskgram is a desktop app that lets you post to Instagram from PC or Mac, as well as browsing, commenting, and liking posts as you would on the mobile app.
You can upload photos and videos – although the video is not currently supported on Windows – use filters, trim video, tag other accounts in posts, and hashtag search.
Image source: Image source: Pricing:
$2. 99 monthly
There is a free version that does not include uploading. You need to download this free version and then ‘upgrade’ in order to access the paid version.
A useful but slightly basic tool to post to Instagram from PC or Mac. The lack of video upload for Windows is a downside, and as you can’t upload in bulk it does not offer anything additional from Bluestacks, which is a free service.
Tag Images
Tag Locations
Download Deskgram here.
Uplet (Mac Only)
Uplet is a downloadable Instagram uploader exclusively for Mac. You can bulk upload photos and videos from your computer and send them straight to your Instagram profile with a caption, all you need to do is download it and log in with your Instagram details. A recent update now also allows you to send posts to multiple Instagram accounts that you manage.
The program has a very simple interface as you can see from the screenshots below:
Photo source: Uplet lacks any filters or editing features, although you are able to shrink your posts to make them portrait or landscape. If uploading a video to the program, ensure it is ready to go with Instagram’s 60-second limit, as Uplet does not have in-app trimming features.
Personal License (for 1 Mac) $19. 95
Team License (for 5 Macs) $49. 95
Business License (for 1 Mac) $49. 95
Uplet is a useful tool if you always use Mac, edit your photos and videos on other software, and are looking to upload in bulk! The price is a one-off fee for full use of the product.
Filters
Windows
4. Facebook Creator Studio For Instagram From PC
In August 2019, Facebook launched native Instagram scheduling into their Creator Studio platform, meaning users with a business Instagram profile linked to a Facebook page are able to upload to Instagram from their PC.
The unique thing about Facebook’s Creator Studio is that you can schedule and post IGTV videos from it, which was their first Instagram feature on the platform targeted at influencers and creatives.
This is a great free alternative to posting to Instagram from PC or Mac, however, it is limiting if you’re managing Instagram content on mass, as they don’t offer a bulk upload option to create multiple posts at once.
Another key restriction of the functionality is the inability to edit scheduled posts — so if you need to make changes to captions or tags, you will have to delete the existing post and make a new one. Time-consuming workarounds such as this can somewhat defeat the point of posting to Instagram from a desktop.
Got a touchscreen Windows 10 computer? Find out how to post to Instagram directly from it!
Click here to find out your best time to post on Instagram from optimum engagement, with a free tool from Hopper HQ.
Frequently Asked Questions about instagram post from firefox
How do I post on Instagram from Firefox on my computer?
Posting to Instagram with Firefox From Firefox’s main menu, go to Tools > Web Developer > Responsive Design Mode. (You can also use a keyboard shortcut to toggle it. On Mac, it’s CMD+OPT+M.) You should then see a small, responsive version of the site that includes the add photo button.Sep 10, 2021
Can you make Instagram posts from browser?
Bluestacks is an Android emulator for your Mac or PC and offers a scaled-back version of the Instagram Android app, all you need is a Google account. … Once you download Bluestacks on to your computer, you will need to upload your content into the Media Manager on the platform.Jun 7, 2021
How do I upload videos to Instagram from Firefox?
Upload Pictures and Videos to Instagram From WindowsMozilla Firefox. Step 1- In Mozilla Firefox, go to Instagram.com. Step 2- Log in with your Instagram username and password. … Google Chrome. Step 1- In Google Chrome, go to Instagram.com. Step 2- Log in with your Instagram ID and password.Mar 22, 2018
