How to do a giveaway on Instagram, step by step

A giveaway is the quickest way to get a burst of comments, new followers and attention on Instagram. It also goes wrong easily: vague rules, a winner picked by scrolling, or a fake account messaging your entrants. Here is how to run one properly, from the first idea to the prize arriving.

1. Decide what the giveaway is for

Choose one goal, because it decides the entry rules. If you want followers, ask people to follow. If you want reach, ask them to tag a friend. If you want leads, start a conversation with everyone who enters. A giveaway that tries to do everything ends up with five entry steps and fewer entrants.

2. Pick a prize your audience actually wants

Your own product or service usually beats a generic gadget: it attracts people who might buy from you, not prize hunters who unfollow the day after. Decide how many winners there will be, what each one gets, what it's worth, and where you can ship it.

3. Write the official rules

Instagram makes whoever runs the giveaway responsible for its rules and for following the law. At a minimum, the rules say:

• Who can enter: minimum age, which countries or states, and who is excluded.
• When it starts and ends, with the time zone.
• How to enter, and whether people can enter more than once.
• How and when the winner is picked.
• How winners are contacted and how long they have to reply.
• What the prize is and what it's worth.
• That Instagram doesn't sponsor or run the giveaway, and that entrants release Instagram from responsibility.

Our guide to Instagram giveaway rules has a full checklist and the legal points to check.

4. Choose how people enter

• Comment a keyword, such as WIN: the easiest step for people to do and for you to check.
• Tag friends in the comments: allowed. Instagram's guidelines only forbid asking people to tag themselves in photos they aren't in.
• Follow the account: popular, but no tool can check it from comments, because Instagram doesn't share follower lists with apps.
• Share the post to their story: hard to verify, so many hosts make it a bonus entry rather than a requirement.

5. Write the post

Lead with the prize, then number the entry steps, then give the closing date and time. Put the short version of the rules in the caption and link to the full rules from your bio. End with the statement Instagram requires, for example:

6. Confirm entries as they come in

Replying to every comment by hand stops working after the first hundred. A comment-to-DM automation can answer each entrant for you. The giveaway template in MuChat sends everyone who comments your keyword a DM with an entry button, checks they follow you when they tap it, and tags them as entered.

7. Close entries and pick the winner fairly

Stop counting entries at the time you announced. Then draw at random with a tool that applies your rules rather than scrolling and pointing. MuChat's free Instagram comment picker loads the comments on your own post through Instagram's official API, keeps one entry per person, checks the keyword and mentions, leaves out comments after the closing time, and draws backup winners too.

8. Contact the winner, and warn about fake accounts

Message the winner from your own account and give them a deadline to reply, such as 48 hours, before you move to the first backup. Scammers copy the names and photos of accounts running giveaways and message entrants to say they won, then ask for card details or a shipping fee. Say in the post that winners will only hear from your account and that you will never ask for payment.

9. Announce the winner and deliver the prize

Announce the result in a story or a comment, with the winner's permission, and send the prize promptly. Keep a screenshot or copy of the draw in case anyone asks how the winner was picked.

Common mistakes

• No end date, so nobody knows when entries closed.
• Asking people to buy something to enter. In many countries that turns a giveaway into an illegal lottery.
• Running a giveaway on a partner's post without their account picking the winner.
• Leaving out the statement that Instagram isn't involved.
• Picking the winner by hand, which looks unfair even when it isn't.