How to auto-reply on Instagram DMs and comments

Instagram auto-replies only work on a professional account, Business or Creator. Once you have one, there are three ways to answer people automatically. Instagram’s own frequently asked questions answer up to four questions when someone starts a chat with you. Meta Business Suite adds automated responses for your inbox, such as an instant reply and an away message. And apps connected to Meta’s messaging API go further, answering keywords in DMs, comments on your posts and replies to your Stories.

Saved replies, often the first thing people find, are not auto-replies at all. They store answers you insert with a shortcut, and a person still presses send. A personal account gets none of these tools, so if yours is personal, switch it to a professional account first. That’s free in Settings, and you can switch back.

This is the built-in option, and it costs nothing. You write up to four questions, each with an automated answer. People see the questions when they open a chat with you; tapping one sends it as their message, and your answer comes back straight away.

1. Open your messages. Recent versions put Messages in the bar at the bottom of the screen; older ones kept it at the top right of your feed.
2. Tap more actions, then Tools.
3. Under Tools, tap Frequently asked questions and turn on Show questions.
4. Tap Add question. Type the question the way a customer would ask it, add the automated response and tap Save.
5. Add up to four. To change or remove one later, tap it, edit or delete it, and save.

Tip: Word each question as a customer would type it. “Do you deliver to Pune?” gets tapped; “Delivery policy” looks like a form field nobody wants to fill in.

If there’s no Tools option, update the app and check that the account is a professional one. Instagram moves these menus between versions, and older versions kept frequently asked questions in Settings with the other business or creator tools.

If your Instagram account is connected to Meta Business Suite, its inbox has automated responses that work on Instagram messages as well as Messenger. Open Business Suite on a computer or in its app, go to Inbox, then Automations, and pick the response you want. Names shift between versions, but these are the ones most accounts use:

• Instant reply: an automatic answer to people who start a conversation with you. Thank them, say what you can help with and when a person will reply.
• Away message: sent while you’re set as away, or outside the hours you choose. Put a real return time in it, such as “back at 10 a.m. on Monday”.
• Frequently asked questions: questions people can tap when they open a chat, each with your answer.
• Custom keywords: a reply sent when a message contains a word or phrase you pick, such as “price” or “open today”.

Business Suite’s automations are free and need no other app. They’re built for messages that land in your inbox, though. For anything that starts somewhere else, such as a comment under a Reel or a reply to a Story, or for a conversation that runs over several steps, people use apps connected to Meta’s messaging API.

Comment-to-DM is the set-up behind every “comment GUIDE and I’ll send it to you” post. Someone comments the word, and the app answers publicly under the comment and sends the commenter a private message. That message uses Meta’s private replies, which come with fixed rules:

• One message per comment. Each comment can be answered with a single private reply.
• Seven days. The message has to go out within 7 days of the comment, and comments made during an Instagram Live can only be answered while the Live is running.
• Text only. The first message can’t include a link or a button, so it asks for an answer: “Reply YES and I’ll send you the guide.”
• Nothing more until they reply. Their answer opens a 24-hour window in which the link, buttons or a product card can follow.
• Inbox or requests. Followers get the message in their inbox; everyone else finds it in their message requests.
• A speed limit. Instagram allows at most 750 private replies an hour per account, so a Reel with thousands of keyword comments takes hours to answer in full.

Tip: Use the public reply to say where the DM went: “Sent! If you don’t follow us, it’s in your message requests.” People who don’t follow you are the ones most likely to think it never arrived.

Most DMs a business receives are a handful of questions asked in different words. A keyword auto-reply answers whenever a message contains a word you choose, such as PRICE, HOURS or MENU. Because the person wrote to you first, the answer can carry a link card or buttons straight away. The text-only rule covers the first message after a comment, not replies to someone who messaged you.

• Cover the ways people ask. Someone after your prices might write “price”, “prices”, “cost” or “how much”, so add each one.
• Leave out words that turn up everywhere. HI or THANKS would fire on messages that need a person.
• Test each keyword from a second account, typos included, before you announce it.

Story replies can be answered the same way, on Instagram only. A Story that says “reply PLAN and I’ll send the meal plan” can answer every reply as it arrives, and people who mention you in their own Stories can get a thank-you message. Facebook Pages have no Story trigger like this.

Meta’s own tools and every app built on its API work inside the same limits. Knowing them helps you spot a tool that promises something it can’t deliver.

Tip: Official apps connect through Instagram’s or Facebook’s own login screen. If an auto-reply app asks you to type your Instagram password into its own form, close it. It would be using your account as you, outside Meta’s rules, and any penalty lands on your account, not theirs.

• Say it’s automatic. “This is an automatic reply” at the top sets expectations, and makes a slower human follow-up easier to forgive.
• Answer first. Put the price, the hours or the yes in the opening line; detail can follow.
• Offer a person. End with a way to reach one, such as “Reply TEAM and someone will pick this up today.”
• Keep it short. A message sent through Meta’s API holds at most 1,000 bytes of text: about 1,000 English letters, but roughly a third as many in Hindi, and fewer again with emoji.
• Avoid double replies. If an instant reply and a keyword reply can both answer one message, send yourself a test and see what a customer would get.
• Reread them monthly. Prices, dates and links inside automatic answers go out of date while nobody is looking.

DMFast, made by the team behind this site, is one of the tools built on Meta’s official API. It covers comment-to-DM, DM keywords, and Story replies and mentions for Instagram professional accounts, plus comment and keyword replies for Facebook Pages. The first DM after a comment is plain text and the link card follows the person’s answer. Comments that are only links or promotions are skipped, and each person is answered once a day per auto-reply. On the Growth and Business plans, AI replies can take the questions no keyword catches, written only from the business details you provide.