NFTs on Instagram: How to Show Off Your Digital Collectibles

Instagram began testing non-fungible token (NFT) sharing on its platform in May 2022, allowing select U.S. users to connect to their digital wallet and showcase NFTs that they either created or bought.

In August 2022, the social media platform expanded its testing to 100 countries across Africa, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and the Americas, and added support for Coinbase Wallet and Dapper Wallet. Meta Platforms, Instagram's parent company (also Facebook's owner), didn't release a specific list of countries that the test phase is rolling out to or how it is determining who is able to access the feature.

In May 2022, Instagram wrote that it was focused on improving its user experience by creating more monetization opportunities and bringing NFTs to a broader audience. While the feature is still in its testing phase, here’s how it works.

What does having NFTs on Instagram mean?

Instagram’s NFT integration allows users to connect to their digital wallets and choose which NFTs to share with their followers. This feature sort of functions as a digital art gallery, and the NFTS you own or have created can be pinned to your feed next to your other images.

Once a user posts his or her NFT image, the platform adds a shimmery effect to the image and displays public information about the NFT, like a description of the collection, piece or tagging the creator. The shimmery effect functions similarly to the hexagonal profile pic on Twitter, visually indicating authenticity and ownership over the asset.

Both the creator and collector can be automatically attributed in-feed, another function meant to help track the authenticity and ownership of an NFT. Meta says there are no fees associated with sharing a digital collectible on Instagram.

As of August 2022, the platform didn't support buying and selling digital collectibles.

The integration is part of Meta’s company-wide exploration into Web3 technologies, which it says is aimed at expanding access, reducing costs and accelerating innovation as it expands its metaverse ambitions. In March 2022, CEO Mark Zuckerberg teased wider NFT integrations across the company's sites, like augmented-reality NFTs that can be shared on Instagram stories, and the ability to mint NFTs from Instagram.

How to post your NFT to Instagram

The feature wasn’t available to everyone as of August 2022 and was being released on a limited basis. The only way to tell if you are in the test group is to check if the “Digital Collectible” option is available to you as shown in the screenshot below.

The test allows connections to third-party wallets, including Rainbow, MetaMask, Trust Wallet, Coinbase Wallet and Dapper Wallet. The blockchains it supported as of August 2022 were Ethereum, Polygon and Flow, with Solana to be added in the future.

Users can connect their digital wallets to the platform by visiting the “Digital Collectible” menu. Once there, a notification will open on your screen taking you through the next steps of connecting to a wallet. You can also connect additional wallets to your account by clicking the “Add Wallet” button. Wallet connection is a one-time authentication, and Meta says it doesn't “publicly surface” your wallet address.

Next, users can view all of their NFTs and share them as a post. Similar to sharing any other post on Instagram, users can tap the plus sign at the top of their screen and then select “Post.” A special verified checkmark will appear above your phone’s library, which will allow you to select any of the NFTs in your wallet. You can add a description to the selected NFT before sharing it to your feed.

When you share your digital collectible, you will be tagged as the owner or creator of that collectible. Instagram confirms ownership of the blockchain address associated with the collectible to authenticate ownership. Users can discover your digital collectibles in-feed, on your main grid and through the platform’s Explore page.

Ways to monetize NFTs on Instagram

Connecting your wallet to Instagram may be a good way to show off your NFT collection or creations and verify its authenticity. The move follows other social media platforms like Twitter and Reddit that have recently added NFT functionalities.

As of August 2022, users couldn't use certain tools like Collab posting, fundraising, location tagging and monetization features like branded content and boosting that traditionally help content creators make money. The main opportunity regarding monetization was to use Instagram NFTs as an additional way to market or build hype for an NFT collection.

The platform might make it easier to mint or transact with digital collectibles, possibly expanding its Shop functionality. But as of August 2022, the limited feature is mainly being used like an NFT trophy case by a small group of testers.