how accessible is instagram

I use the app on an iPad. It seems to work well with Voiceover.

Hey,
Sometimes when I try to scroll to the top, it will take me to a completely different people of Instagram.
I loved the older versions where there were tabs at the bottom of the screen to switch between feed, activity, etc.
I believe there still are, but you have to go through your whole feed just to find them.

On an iPad I have the tabs you speak of along the bottom. They remain there as I scroll down and up through my main feed.

Hey there folks!
I'm blind of birth and use Instagram, but only partially. I find it too difficult to understand what's on my feed and besides, there is no AI that can describe pictures, or at least if there is one, its' not legal in Europe. I post pics though and that works rather well.... A good way around issues, is to ask your instagram contacts to link their Instagram account to their Facebook one, so that all the pics posted on Insta can be found on FB. All in all, I think Insta would work well for partially-sighted users.... As for blind users, well, use it to post pics if you are into that.

It doesn't describe pictures (through alt-text or something) so you have to rely on captions, but as far as the app itself goes, I've had no problems with it.

Hello, I'm trying Instagram in July 2026 and I am facing several problems: firstly, there are certain menus such as muting a contact, reporting etc. that when opened apparently cannot be closed; secondly, when browsing through posts VO announces, for instance, 6 photos/videos posted. However when opening the post I can't swipe between the photos the person posted. And lastly, there is no share button for exporting the photo and describing it with, say, BeMyEyes. I must screenshot every single time, with the annoyance that I have loads of screenshots in the library and that the description will include the interface without properly describing the photo in full. How do you use Instagram in 2026?

For some basic stuff, Instagram is pretty accessible. Unfortunately, accessibility seems to be breaking. Sometimes, an element will be accessible with voiceover, but then Meta updates Instagram, adding a new feature, and they break it. They break accessibility, but then fix it on another screen, so accessibility is not perfect.

Also, posts are not the most accessible either. For a while, you could use the swipe-up or down action with the voiceover to view multiple photos in a post. Unfortunately, voiceover doesn't do that anymore, so even if the photos have image descriptions, you cannot view those photos anymore.

Speaking of image descriptions, the image descriptions that Meta gives, and they've been giving these image descriptions for a while, and I don't know why. The image description of maybe an image of a dog in text, or maybe an image of a phone screen, lacks all context. In fact, one time I saw someone post a picture of the dog. The Instagram AI just said maybe an image of text, but I didn't have any detail on what was going on. Unfortunately, the person posting did not add any caption, so I had no context as to what the image was. I used AI to send over the screenshot of Instagram, and it was able to give me a lot more detail. The only thing, though, is I wish it would just get only the image. I would prefer to somehow get the image in full screen. Unfortunately, you cannot do that with Instagram.

I also saw a video uploaded by an account that was private that I am following. Unfortunately, the video just contained background music, and when I shared it to Pixie Bot, which is the video describer that uses artificial intelligence, it gave me a very well-thought-out image description. However, it described the Instagram layout, which I don't need. A rundown of the Instagram layout.

The reason why I did this is because I could not upload the private video link, but I found a loophole. I just screen recorded the private video and uploaded it to Pixie Bot, where it can then describe the video to me in full detail. However, I have not used Facebook, but I have heard that it is accessible. I've also heard that there are some accessibility issues within Facebook now. I feel like a lot of app developers are not putting a lot of accessibility anymore. I feel like accessibility seems to kind of be vanishing now, because I remember a time when a lot of apps used to be accessible. While apps are still developed to be accessible, I still feel like accessibility is not the developer's main priority anymore. However, there are some apps that, of course, work with voiceover and that the developer has prioritized.

Hello! Unfortunately, if you update Instagram, you will no longer be able to read the text on stories other than your own. Apparently, this issue exists on both Android and iOS.