Reading a product drop that has left the feed
Retail accounts park drops in highlights instead of the grid. One call per tray gives you a dated catalogue of what shipped and when, without touching their website.
Instagram API / Highlight Stories
Instagram Highlight Items API — Every Story Inside One Highlight Tray
Pass a highlight id and get the frames in that tray: media URLs, the original taken_at and the stickers as posted. The Highlights API gives you the ids; this reads one tray.
1 credit per request · request metadata included · errors are never charged
GET /v1/instagram/highlight-stories1 creditcurl "https://api.socialscrape.dev/v1/instagram/highlight-stories?highlight_id=17901234567890123" \
-H "x-api-key: $INSCRAPE_KEY"Parameters
highlight_idstringrequiredHighlight id from the highlights endpoint
What you get
What the Instagram Highlight Items API returns.
- Every frame in the tray, in the order the tray plays them
- Media URL and type per frame, image or video
- Original taken_at for each frame, often months or years old
- Link, mention and hashtag stickers with their targets, preserved from the original story
Use cases
Instagram Highlight Items API use cases.
Reconstructing a campaign timeline
Frames keep their original timestamps, so a tray is a chronology, not a snapshot. That is how you date content posted long before you started tracking the account.
Turning tray titles into structure
The Highlights API tells you a brand keeps trays called FAQ, Shipping and Reviews. This endpoint tells you what they put inside them, which is where the positioning actually is.
FAQ
Instagram Highlight Items API FAQ.
Why does this take two calls?
Tray ids only exist in the highlights response and there is no lookup by tray title. Call /highlights once for the profile, then /highlight-stories per tray you care about. Both cache for 24 hours, so a daily sweep of one profile costs very little.
Do highlight items expire like stories?
No, and that is the point of the endpoint. A story is gone in 24 hours, which is why the Stories API caches for ten minutes. A highlight stays until the account removes it, so this one caches for a full day.
Can I see who viewed a highlight?
No. Viewer lists are visible only to the account owner inside the app, and nothing in this API returns them. You get the content, not the audience.
Does it work on private accounts?
No. A confirmed private-account result returns 200 with available profile details and is charged at the endpoint rate. Private content is not returned.
Related endpoints
APIs commonly paired with highlight stories.
Instagram Highlights API
List the highlight trays on a public Instagram profile: tray id, title, cover image and item count. The frames inside a tray come from the Highlight Items API.
Instagram Story Scraper
Read currently live stories on public Instagram accounts as JSON, with media URLs, stickers and expiry timestamps.
Instagram Profile Scraper
Get follower counts, bio, verification status and external links for any public Instagram profile. One REST call, no login, no Meta app review.
Back to the full Instagram API overview, or read the highlight stories endpoint documentation.