Instagram has gradually been increasing functionality as users demand more and more ways to communicate with friends and followers. However, they continue to place limitations on those same functions, requiring users to jump through hoops in order to accomplish their goals.
With the advent of Instagram videos, users can take videos, share them on their account or via direct message, and post them to their Story. However, these videos come with time limits. Users can post videos between 3 seconds and a minute to their general Instagram feed. If they post to their story, the the video is limited to only 15 seconds.
So how do you get around Instagram’s limited functionality? There are a few methods for getting your lengthy videos on the app.
Method One: Multiple Clips
The most straight-forward way to get around this is to simply post your video in increments.
Let’s say you have a 1 minute video that you’d like to add to your Instagram story, but can’t because it’s exactly 45 seconds too long.
When you select that video for sharing to your story, it will be automatically trimmed down to the first 15 seconds. If you don’t want to butcher your video, you’ll want to do a little editing of your own before uploading it to Stories.
Use your phone’s video editing features to trim the video into 15 second incriminates. Soon you’ll have your 1-minute video trimmed to four 15-second clips.
Next, it’s time to share that series of clips on Instagram. Do this the old-fashioned way instead of directly to Stories to make sure the clips are in the right order.
- Tap to add images and videos from your camera roll.
- Tap to add several together.
- Select the clips you want in order.
- Tap Next.
- Edit clips to your preference.
- Tap Next.
- Add a caption and location.
- Tap Share.
This will share the video to your regular Instagram feed and from there it can be shared to your Story. This may seem unnecessary, because your feed can post the full minute, but there’s no way to edit and splice together video clips if you bypass the feed and share directly to your Story.
When someone goes to view your story, they’ll see them run in order. It won’t be perfectly seamless, but it’ll be close. You can also rearrange the order of the clips if you want to engage in a little ham-handed video editing.
Method Two: Use an App
Does the above method sound a little daunting? There are several apps on the market that will effectively do the same thing, only they make it a lot easier on you.
Continual for Instagram – iPhone
If you’re an iPhone user, consider shelling out $7. 99 for Continual for Instagram. This app automatically trims your lengthier video into 15-second increments for sharing to your Story. You can then upload the clips together or individually.
StorySplitter – iPhone
Maybe $7. 99 is just a bit too much just so you can share some longer videos. StorySplitter is free for iOS users (. 99 for the premium version). It does effectively the same thing, splitting videos into 15-second clips. However, unlike Continual for Instagram, it doesn’t allow you to post videos in landscape format and unless you spring for the premium version, it will watermark your images.
CutStory – iPhone
Finally, there’s CutStory for iOS. This is very similar to Story Splitter, only it isn’t reserved just for Instagram. CutStory allows you to prep and post videos to Facebook and WhatsApp. With CutStory, you can automatically trim your video to the correct size clips for your chosen app or cut it to any length you want.
Story Cutter – Android
Not an iPhone user? No problem. There are plenty of similar apps for Android. Story Cutter is a popular app that allows you to cut videos to any length clip you want. Basically, you determine the segment length and the app cuts the video for you. This makes it ideal for more social media platforms than just Instagram, as they all have their own length restrictions.
Method Three: Go Live
The one major downside to the two methods mentioned above is that your videos won’t be seamless. Although Instagram Stories will play them in order automatically, they may come across as mildly jerky where one clip ends and another begins. If you want your video to be whole, then try doing it live first.
Instagram live videos can be up to an hour in length. And with recent updates, they can be posted to your Story where they are visible for 24-hours. Of course, this won’t let you post the video to your regular Instagram collection. It can only be shared to Stories once complete. However, it’s better than nothing, and you can always save it to your phone or desktop for later editing.
If none of these methods sounds appealing to you, then you might just have to share on Facebook instead until Instagram gets with the program. Happy sharing!
