In this article we are going to discuss how you can automate your Instagram with Python and Instapy. Following from the previous tutorial on automating twitter with python – we are going to do something similar with available libraries for Instagram.

What we will cover in this tutorial:

• Set up development environment – specifically for ubuntu
• Install instapy
• Create an instagram session
• Schedule python script to run on system file

Set up development environment – for automating Instagram with python and Instapy

We are going to work from an Ubuntu virtual machine, you can get one here:

Get digital ocean droplet, and use this video to set it up: initial virtual server set-up.

Then you can follow the following steps: note that if you get a virtual machine with Digital Ocean, you should select the latest version of Ubuntu and it will come pre-installed with python 3.8 (Ubuntu 20.04).

The steps we will be following are also available from the official Instapy documentation website.

Run this from the command like – to install python3 supporting libraries, pip3 etc.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get -y install unzip python3-pip python3-dev build-essential libssl-dev libffi-dev xvfb

Install virtual environment

pip3 install virtualenv

Install Chrome and Firefox – tools that Instapy uses in the background, you need these for Instapy to work. Use wget to download chrome:

cd ~
wget "https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb"

Install chrome

sudo dpkg -i google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

If you get errors, jus run the following command:

apt-get -f install

Remove the downloaded file:

sudo rm google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

Install firefox and driver

sudo apt-get install firefox 
sudo apt install firefox-geckodriver

Navigate to the folder you want to work from and create virtual environment

mkdir instagram && cd instagram
virtualenv instagramenv
source instagramenv/bin/activate

pip install instapy

After running all the commands above successfully, you will have instapy installed inside of a virtual environment, you can start working with.

Create Instapy Session – Run some code

Create a file called config.py where you will enter your instagram username and password:

In the same directory, create the following file – main.py

from instapy import InstaPy, smart_run
import config



def wordPressSession():
    comments = [
            'Learn more from https://skolo.online',
            'Learn WordPress https://skolo.online',
            'Learn WooCommerce from https://skolo.online',
            'Yes! Amazing stuff',
            'Just love wordpress',
            'Check us out https://skolo.online',
            'Check out Youtube https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'Free Learning Videos https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'Online Learning https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'WooCommerce Series https://rb.gy/hgc8um',
            'Learn WordPress https://rb.gy/hgc8um',
            'Learn WooCommerce https://rb.gy/hgc8um'
            ]

    session = InstaPy(username=config.insta_username,
                      password=config.insta_password,
                      headless_browser=True)

    try:
        with smart_run(session):
            session.like_by_tags(["wordpress", 'woocommerce'], amount=10)
            session.set_do_comment(True, percentage=50)
            session.set_comments(comments)
    except:
        import traceback
        print(traceback.format_exc())
        pass


wordPressSession()

The code above will log you in to your instagram profile, search for the tags you have provides: ‘wordpress’ and ‘woocommerce’. It will then like a number of statuses with those tags, even comment on 50% of the statuses with the comments you have provided in the list.

Run this file by entering in the command line:

python main.py

Automate the whole process

The reason why we are running this on a virtual server is, we want the ability to run this code continuously on a schedule. Python provides a scheduling library fit for this purpose:

While still inside the virtual environment:

pip install schedule

Then edit your code to look like this:

from instapy import InstaPy, smart_run
import config
import schedule
import time
import random



def wordPressSession():
    comments = [
            'Learn more from https://skolo.online',
            'Learn WordPress https://skolo.online',
            'Learn WooCommerce from https://skolo.online',
            'Yes! Amazing stuff',
            'Just love wordpress',
            'Check us out https://skolo.online',
            'Check out Youtube https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'Free Learning Videos https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'Online Learning https://rb.gy/n7tfbn',
            'WooCommerce Series https://rb.gy/hgc8um',
            'Learn WordPress https://rb.gy/hgc8um',
            'Learn WooCommerce https://rb.gy/hgc8um'
            ]

    session = InstaPy(username=config.insta_username,
                      password=config.insta_password,
                      headless_browser=True)

    try:
        with smart_run(session):
            session.like_by_tags(["wordpress", 'woocommerce'], amount=10)
            session.set_do_comment(True, percentage=50)
            session.set_comments(comments)
    except:
        import traceback
        print(traceback.format_exc())
        pass



schedule.every().day.at("08:00").do(wordPressSession)

while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(1)

The code above will run the function called: wordPressSession() – everyday at 08:00.

Create system file called Instagram:

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/instagram.service

Inside the file, paste the following:

[Unit]
Description=Instagram Bot Skolo Online Service
After=multi-user.target

[Service]
Type=simple
Environment="PATH=/home/username/instagram/instagramenv/bin"
ExecStart=/home/username/instagram/instagramenv/bin/python /home/username/instagram/main.py


[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

The code above will need to be modified for your use case:

Environment: Should be the absolute path to your env file/bin

Exec Start: Should be the absolute path to your python inside the env and the file location you are running. Sort of like: python main.py – but with absolute paths.

After this run:

sudo systemctl start instagram
sudo systemctl enable instagram
sudo systemctl status instagram

You should see a nice green light, after the last command when checking on the status of your system file – if all is well. If not check the error message and fix accordingly – the usual cause for errors is wrong absolute paths in the system file.

Full Video Tutorial – Automate instagram with python and instapy:

Full youtube video tutorial below.