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Stories - Instagram Glossary

Stories are full-screen photo or video posts that disappear after 24 hours, shown in a tray above the feed. They reach a smaller slice of your followers than the feed but drive far more direct replies, making them the platform's main relationship-maintenance surface.

Story reach is almost entirely follower reach, and it decays with the order of the tray. That order is driven by past interaction, which creates a compounding effect in both directions: people who reply to your stories keep seeing them, and people who never do drift to the back and effectively stop.

The highest-value thing a story can do is provoke a reply, because a story reply opens a DM thread. A poll gets taps; a question sticker gets messages. If you are trying to generate conversations rather than impressions, the sticker you choose is a bigger lever than the content behind it.

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