Navigation is a story insight. It's the total number of actions people took to move through or leave your story, made up of four actions: forward, back, next story and exited.
| Action | What the viewer did | What it can mean |
|---|---|---|
| Forward | Tapped to skip to your next photo or video | This part didn't hold them, or they'd seen enough |
| Back | Tapped back to see the previous one again | They wanted another look, often a good sign, or the text went by too fast |
| Next story | Swiped to the next account's story | They left your stories for someone else's |
| Exited | Left stories altogether | They stopped watching stories at this point |
Is a high navigation number bad?
Not by itself. Every viewer has to navigate somehow: a tap forward to the next frame is how stories work. The useful comparison is between frames of the same story. If one frame gets far more swipes to the next story or exits than the others, that's where people lost interest.
Where to find it
Open a story you posted and tap Activity, then Insights. For older stories, go to your professional dashboard and open Content you shared. Instagram keeps story insights for two years, although the story itself disappears after 24 hours. Instagram has been reorganizing story insights: its help center now lists Views, Viewers, Interactions and Accounts engaged, and not every account sees a Navigation figure in the app. Apps connected through Instagram's API can still read it.
How to get fewer exits
- Put the point in the first frame: the offer, the question or the news.
- Keep a series short. Several frames saying the same thing invite taps forward.
- Give people something to do, like a poll, a question sticker or a link sticker. Interaction keeps them on the frame.
- Leave time to read: if many viewers tap back on a frame, show its text for longer or use fewer words.
Turn comments into conversations
MuChat answers Instagram comments, story replies and DMs automatically. The Free plan needs no card.