Instagram will let users change music on posts after publishing
The new Replace Audio tool lets creators update songs on old Instagram posts without reuploading or losing engagement.
By Hana Yoshida · Markets Reporter
3 min read
Instagram is adding a tool that lets users swap the music attached to already published posts, a change aimed at creators who want old content to fit new trends. The company said users will be able to replace audio on past photos and videos without deleting and reposting them.
Jimmy O’Keefe, Instagram’s head of creator product marketing, said in an emailed statement that creators should not be stuck with every choice they made when they first published a post. He said Instagram has been working toward letting content change over time, including tools for reordering profile grids, changing captions and now updating music.
O’Keefe told The Verge by email that changing the audio will not give creators an algorithmic boost. He also said users will be able to replace a post’s audio as many times as they want while keeping existing likes, comments and shares.
Another creator-focused Instagram tool
The Replace Audio feature follows several recent Instagram changes designed to give users more control over how posts appear after publication. In June, Instagram announced that users could rearrange posts on their profile grid rather than keep everything locked in chronological order, The Verge reported.
The company later added the ability to write separate captions for individual photos or videos inside a carousel post, according to The Verge. Together, those tools give creators more room to edit, reshape and present posts after they go live.
The audio change could be especially useful for creators and advertisers who rely on trending sounds. A video that performed well with one song could later be matched with another track without giving up the audience response already attached to the original post.
That also means viewers may come across posts whose soundtracks have changed since they first saw them. Instagram has not said, according to the reported comments from O’Keefe, that the platform will treat an audio swap as a reason to promote the post more widely.
Instagram keeps courting creators
The rollout comes as Instagram continues to compete with TikTok for creators and short-form video attention, The Verge reported. Features such as Reels and recommended posts from accounts users do not follow have already made Instagram look more like TikTok in recent years.
The Verge reported that Instagram’s latest changes may be more useful to professional posters than to casual users. For someone using Instagram mainly to share personal updates, changing the song on a year-old post may have limited appeal.
Instagram has also introduced a paid tier aimed at people who want more visibility with friends, according to The Verge. The $3.99-per-month Instagram Plus tier includes Story Spotlight, which gives a story priority for friends, flashier heart emoji, stories that expire after 48 hours and a way to see how many people viewed a story more than once.
The new audio tool points to a broader shift in how Instagram treats posts. Rather than treating them as fixed snapshots, the company is giving users more ways to revise old material while preserving the engagement it has already collected.
This story draws on original reporting from The Verge.