How to Connect Instagram DMs to Your AI Agent (Step-by-Step Guide)

Instagram has quietly become one of the busiest customer service channels for small businesses. Customers browse a Reel, see a product they like, and immediately send a DM — often expecting a reply within minutes. For most business owners managing Instagram on their phones, that expectation is exhausting to meet consistently.

The gap is real: over 60% of Instagram DMs to businesses go unanswered within the first hour, and a slow reply is often the difference between a sale and a lost customer who moves on to a competitor. Add in story replies (customers commenting on your ephemeral content) and post comments (public conversations under your Reels and photos), and the volume of Instagram engagement that needs a timely, on-brand response adds up fast.

Botline's Instagram integration brings all three surfaces — DMs, story replies, and post comments — into the same inbox as your WhatsApp conversations. The same AI that replies to WhatsApp customers picks up Instagram conversations too, using the same knowledge base and menu you already have. No retraining. No separate inbox to monitor. Just one screen for every channel.

Here is exactly what is live today when you connect your Instagram account to Botline:

• Direct messages (DMs) — text, images, videos, voice notes, and emoji reactions, both inbound and outbound.
• Story replies — when a customer replies to one of your stories, the original story snapshot is preserved above their reply in the inbox (useful especially after the story expires). AI sees the caption and visual context before generating a reply.
• Post and Reel comments — all comments on your posts and Reels appear in a dedicated Comments tab. You can reply, hide, or delete each comment. By default, AI drafts replies and waits for your approval before anything goes public.
• 24-hour messaging window indicator — Meta restricts businesses from sending DMs after 24 hours of no customer activity. A green, amber, or red dot on each conversation shows how much time remains. The composer locks automatically when the window closes.
• Nightly auto token refresh — long-lived access tokens expire after 60 days, but Botline refreshes them automatically 7 days before expiry. You will never wake up to a silently disconnected account.
• Same AI, same knowledge base, same menu — no additional training required. The AI agent you already configured for WhatsApp handles Instagram with the same rules, the same knowledge, and the same escalation triggers.

Before you open Botline's settings, confirm the following checklist. Each item takes under two minutes to verify:

• An Instagram Business or Creator account — personal Instagram accounts are not supported by Meta's API. If your account is currently set to Personal, go to Instagram → Settings → Account → Switch to Professional Account and choose Business or Creator.
• Your Instagram account linked to a Facebook Page — this is a Meta requirement for API access. In Instagram → Settings → Account → Linked Accounts (or "Meta Accounts Centre"), connect your account to a Facebook Page you own or admin.
• A Meta for Developers app — you will need to create (or reuse an existing) app at developers.facebook.com/apps. If you already have a Meta App for your WhatsApp Cloud API setup, you can add Instagram to the same app.
• A Botline Pro plan or above — Instagram integration is a Pro+ feature. Free and Starter plans see a locked card on the Integrations page.
• About 5 minutes — there is no code to write and no deployment to manage.

Log in to your Botline dashboard and go to Settings → Integrations (or navigate directly to /dashboard/integrations). Scroll down to the Instagram card — it uses the familiar IG gradient and shows one of three states:

• Locked (grey padlock) — your plan does not include Instagram. Upgrade to Pro or above to unlock it.
• Not connected (gradient tile, no account details) — ready to connect. Click Connect Instagram to start the wizard.
• Connected (showing your @handle and last-refresh timestamp) — already live. You can test the connection or disconnect from here.

Click Connect Instagram to open the 3-step wizard.

Open developers.facebook.com/apps in a new tab.

• If you already have a Meta App for WhatsApp Cloud API, you can reuse it — skip directly to Step 3. Adding Instagram to an existing app does not affect your WhatsApp setup.
• If you need to create a new app, click Create App. Choose Other as the use case (or Business if prompted). Give it a name like "My Business — Botline" and confirm. You do not need a business verification at this stage for testing; verification is only required if you want to go beyond the development-tier message limits.

Keep this tab open — you will return to it in the next step.

Inside your Meta App dashboard, look at the left-hand sidebar for Add Products. Find Instagram Graph API (or Instagram) and click Set Up.

1. Follow the prompts to link your Instagram Business / Creator account. Meta will ask you to log in to Facebook and confirm which Instagram account to associate.
2. Confirm the Facebook Page linked to your Instagram account. Meta needs this to verify that you own the Instagram account you are connecting.
3. Once linked, you will see your Instagram account listed under the Instagram product with a status of Connected or Active.

At this point, your Meta App is ready to generate an access token in the next step.

In your Meta App dashboard, open the Tools → Graph API Explorer (accessible from the top menu or directly here).

1. Select your app from the Application dropdown at the top right.
2. Click Generate Access Token and log in when prompted.
3. In the permissions dialog, select all of the following permissions:
   • instagram_business_basic
   • instagram_business_manage_messages
   • instagram_business_manage_comments
   • pages_show_list
   • pages_messaging
   • business_management
4. Click Generate Token, then copy the full token string. It is a long string starting with EAA.

Paste the token into the field in Botline's Instagram connection wizard and click Validate & Connect.

Note: The token you generate in Graph API Explorer is a short-lived user token (valid for about 2 hours). Botline immediately exchanges it for a long-lived token (valid 60 days) and stores it securely. The nightly refresh cron extends it automatically so it never lapses in practice.

After you paste your token and click Validate & Connect, Botline does the following in the background:

• Calls the Meta Graph API to confirm the token is valid and has the required permissions.
• Exchanges the short-lived token for a long-lived 60-day token.
• Resolves your Instagram Business Account ID and stores your @handle for display in the dashboard.
• Registers Botline's webhook endpoint with Meta so that incoming DMs, story replies, and comments are delivered in real time.

If validation succeeds, you will see your Instagram @handle appear on the Integrations card with a green Connected badge. From this moment, all new DMs, story replies, and post comments flow into your Botline inbox alongside WhatsApp conversations.

If you see an error, the most common cause is missing permissions — return to Graph API Explorer and confirm all six permissions listed in Step 4 are ticked.

Meta's Instagram Messaging Policy enforces a 24-hour customer service window. Once a customer sends your business a DM, you have 24 hours to reply to that conversation. After 24 hours of no customer activity, Meta blocks outbound messages from your account to that user.

This rule exists to prevent businesses from spamming users who messaged them once months ago. It is not unique to Botline — every app using the Instagram Graph API works within this constraint.

Botline makes this rule visible so you never accidentally try to reply outside the window:

• Green dot — more than 6 hours remaining. All clear.
• Amber dot — fewer than 6 hours remaining. Review and reply soon.
• Red dot — window closed. The composer is locked for this conversation. Once the customer messages you again, the window reopens automatically.

The AI respects this too — it will not attempt to send a DM reply when the window is closed. If your AI has a draft ready but the window closes before it fires, the draft is held and marked as Window closed — awaiting customer reply in the inbox.

Unlike DMs, Instagram comments are public. Any reply you post appears on your Reel or photo for all of your followers to see. Because of this, Botline treats comments more cautiously than DMs by default.

Default behaviour (safe mode): When a new comment arrives on one of your posts or Reels, Botline's AI drafts a suggested reply and places it in the Comments tab with a red PUBLIC badge. Nothing is posted until a human clicks Publish. This gives you full editorial control over what appears publicly under your content.

Auto-publish (opt-in): If you want AI to post comment replies automatically for high-confidence responses, you can enable it in Settings → AI Configuration → Advanced → Instagram Comments Auto-Publish. Even with this toggle on, Botline only auto-publishes when the AI's confidence score exceeds 92% — a stricter threshold than the 78% used for DMs. Anything below that threshold still queues for manual review.

"Reply via DM" shortcut: For sensitive or complex comments, you can click Reply via DM in the Comments tab. Botline posts a brief public acknowledgement comment ("Thanks for reaching out — we've sent you a DM!") and simultaneously opens a DM thread with the commenter, where you or your AI can continue the conversation privately.

Before handing Instagram fully over to your AI, run a quick 24-hour pilot to build confidence in how it handles your specific customers and content. Here is a simple checklist:

1. Connect your real Instagram account (or a sandbox account if you want zero risk) using the steps above.
2. Send a DM from a friend's phone — a simple product question works well. Watch it arrive in Botline's inbox and check whether the AI reply matches your brand voice and knowledge base.
3. Reply to one of your stories from a friend's account. Confirm the story snapshot appears in the conversation and the AI uses the right context.
4. Post a comment on one of your Reels from a secondary account. Confirm it appears in the Comments tab with a draft reply awaiting your review.
5. Check the 24-hour window dot — watch it tick from green to amber as the pilot DM ages.

After the pilot, review the drafts and published replies, adjust your knowledge base if the AI got anything wrong, and you are ready to go fully live.

The integration shipped today covers the core surfaces — DMs, story replies, and comments. A few follow-ups are already in progress or planned:

• Native Meta OAuth flow — instead of pasting a Graph API Explorer token manually, a one-click "Continue with Meta" OAuth button that handles all permissions automatically. Currently pending Meta App Review approval.
• Instagram @mentions — when another user tags your account in their story or post, it will appear as a notification in your Botline inbox.
• Multilingual AI on Instagram — the same Bedrock Nova, Claude, and GPT model lineup that handles multilingual WhatsApp conversations will be fully supported for Instagram. The AI already switches language based on the customer's message; the Instagram surface is identical in this respect.

Questions? The Botline team is on WhatsApp — message us directly at the number on your dashboard's Help tab, or open a conversation from the chat widget on this page.