Instagram gives you two free auto replies through Meta Business Suite. Here is how to set them up, where they run out, and what to write.
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TL;DR
TL;DR
One reply for everyone is the limitation
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Instagram gives you two automatic replies for free through Meta Business Suite: an Instant Reply that fires when someone messages you for the first time, and an Away Message you can schedule for hours you are not around. Both take about five minutes to set up. Both send the same text to everyone, which is the limitation that eventually pushes people to look for something else.
Two automations, one of each.
Instant Reply goes to anyone starting a new conversation with you. Useful as an acknowledgement so nobody is left wondering whether the message landed.
Away Message can be scheduled, so it covers evenings, weekends or a holiday and switches itself off the rest of the time.
Neither can respond to what the person actually said. Both are the same message regardless of whether someone asked about price, reported a problem, or said hello.
You need an Instagram Business or Creator account with messaging access granted to connected tools. That toggle lives in Instagram itself, under your messaging settings, and has to be on before Meta Business Suite can do anything.
The message is capped at 500 characters, and you can insert the recipient's first name as a variable, which is worth doing since it is the only personalisation available natively.
One message for everyone is fine as an acknowledgement and useless as an answer.
Someone messaging "how much is it" and someone messaging "my order hasn't arrived" get identical replies. One of those is a buyer and the other has a problem, and both are told the same thing about your opening hours.
There is also nothing for comments or Story replies. Native auto replies only cover direct messages someone sends you, so the comment on your Reel asking where to buy something gets nothing at all.
If the first two rows cover what you need, stop here. The native setup is free and takes five minutes, and adding a tool you do not need is a worse outcome than a simple acknowledgement message.
The step up is a keyword trigger: a reply that fires only when the message contains certain words.
Someone who writes price, cost or how much gets your pricing answer. Someone who writes help or problem gets routed toward support. Everyone else gets the default. Several keywords can point at the same reply, so you do not have to guess exactly which word people will use.
Intent detection covers the rest, since people rarely phrase things the way you expect. "Is this still available" and "do you have any left" are the same question and share no keywords.
The same mechanism extends to entry points the native tools cannot see: comments on posts and Reels, Story replies, and mentions. Those are covered in setting up an Instagram auto DM.
One practical note before you build a dozen of these: two flows listening for overlapping keywords will both fire, and the person gets two messages. Keep the keyword sets distinct.
Eight starting points. Keep them short, and delete anything that sounds like a company rather than a person.
First message acknowledgement. Thanks for the message, someone will get back to you today. If it's about an order, send your order number and we'll be quicker.
Away message. We're offline until 9am tomorrow. Leave your question here and we'll answer first thing.
Pricing. Full pricing is here [link]. Happy to talk through which option fits if you tell me a bit about what you need.
Availability. Everything currently in stock is here [link]. If what you're after isn't listed, tell me what it is and I'll check.
Order status. Send your order number and I'll look it up. If it shipped, your tracking link is in your confirmation email.
Booking. You can grab a time here [link]. If nothing works, tell me roughly when suits and we'll sort something.
Common question. Most answers are here [link]. If yours isn't, just ask and I'll reply properly.
Delivering something promised. Here's the [thing] you asked for [link]. Let me know if you have questions.
Two things make the difference between these reading as helpful and reading as automated. Say what happens next rather than only acknowledging receipt, and ask something answerable, so the person has an obvious way to continue. Length is what usually gives it away, not the fact that it was automated.
Auto replies are a first touch, not a conversation.
Complaints. An automated message in response to someone unhappy reads as dismissive, however well written. Route these to a human immediately.
Anything sensitive. Health, money, personal circumstances. If someone has told you something they would not post publicly, answer personally.
Replies to your automation. The whole point of the first message is to start a conversation. If nobody picks it up, you have made things worse than silence. Either watch the inbox or build the follow-up properly, covered in managing the Instagram inbox.
There is also a volume consideration. Automated replies still count toward what Instagram allows you to send, which matters at scale, as covered in Instagram's DM limits. And any tool doing this should be connecting through Meta's official API, not logging in as you, per is Instagram automation safe.
Keyword and intent triggers across DMs, comments and Story replies, running on Meta's official API. Free plan, no card.
Instagram's native automatic message to anyone starting a new conversation with you. One message, the same for everyone, set up in Meta Business Suite. It cannot vary based on what the person wrote.
Not natively. Instagram gives you one Instant Reply and one Away Message. Multiple replies, each triggered by different words, require a tool connected through Meta's API.
In Meta Business Suite, open the Inbox, go to Automations, select the automation, edit the message and save. Check the toggle is still on afterwards, since saving does not activate it.
Not through Instagram's own settings, which only cover direct messages. Replying automatically to comments, publicly or by DM, needs a third-party tool on the official API.
Also not natively. Story replies arrive as DMs, but Instagram's Instant Reply only fires on a new conversation, so an existing contact replying to a Story gets nothing.
Often, if it is generic. A message that arrives instantly, answers what they actually asked and says what happens next reads as fast rather than robotic. Length and vagueness are what give it away.
Yes. Instagram does not distinguish between messages you typed and messages a tool sent on your behalf, which matters once volume grows.
Usually the messaging access toggle in Instagram has been switched off, disconnecting Meta Business Suite from your inbox. Check that first, then check the automation itself is still active.
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