Should you post the same video on TikTok and Instagram?
November 2026
+17%views on Instagram for videos also posted on TikTok, against the same creator's Instagram-only videos. No sign of a penalty.
Instagram has said it shows recycled content to fewer people, and many creators worry that posting the same video on both apps costs them views. We matched the videos creators posted on both, and compared each copy with the same creator's videos posted on one app only.
The top lessons you can use
- Post it on both. Cross-posted Reels got +17% views against the same creator's Instagram-only Reels, and cross-posted TikToks +2% against TikTok-only ones.
- A hit on one app is a good bet on the other. When a video got at least twice the creator's usual on TikTok, it did the same on Instagram 49% of the time, about 2.1 times as often as an average video (24%).
- But a flop on TikTok isn't doomed elsewhere: 11% of videos that got under the usual on TikTok got twice the usual on Instagram.
- Post at the same time if you like: most creators put both up within minutes, and it didn't matter much which went first.
Key points
Cross-posted Reels: +17% views against Instagram-only Reels.
Cross-posted TikToks: +2% against TikTok-only.
A TikTok hit was an Instagram hit 49% of the time (any video: 24%).
The copy that did better against its own usual: Instagram 49%, TikTok 51%.
The specifics
Cross-posting didn't cost views on Instagram
Reels that the creator also posted on TikTok got +17% views against the same creator's Instagram-only Reels (range +4% to +30%, 155 creators). If Instagram shows TikTok copies to fewer people, it didn't show up here, perhaps because creators upload clean files without the TikTok watermark.
Or on TikTok
TikToks also posted on Instagram got +2% views against the same creator's TikTok-only videos (range -10% to +13%), no clear difference.
A hit on one app often hits on the other
Of 2,864 videos that got at least twice the creator's usual on TikTok, 49% did the same on Instagram, against 24% of cross-posted videos overall. How a video did on one app against the creator's usual went with how it did on the other (correlation 0.48), but far from perfectly: 11% of TikTok flops were Instagram hits.
Most creators post on both within minutes
The typical pair went up 5 minutes apart. 67% of pairs went on TikTok first. When TikTok went first, the Reel got +2% against the usual; when Instagram went first, +9%.
Plenty don't cross-post everything
Among creators with accounts on both, the typical one posted 15% of their TikToks to Instagram too, and 44% of their Reels were also on TikTok.
Cross-posted against one-app videos
Views for videos posted on both apps, against the same creator's videos posted on one app only.
Views against one-app videos
Does a hit on TikTok hit on Instagram?
A hit here means at least twice the creator's usual views on that app.
Got twice the usual on Instagram
Short answers from this study
Questions people ask
Is it bad to post the same video on TikTok and Instagram?
Not in our data. Cross-posted Reels got +17% views against the same creator's Instagram-only Reels, and cross-posted TikToks +2%.
Does Instagram penalise TikTok videos?
Instagram has said it favours original content and may show reposts with another app's watermark to fewer people. We can't see watermarks, but videos these creators posted on both apps did no worse on Instagram.
Should I post on TikTok or Instagram first?
It made little difference. Most creators post both within minutes of each other.
If a video flops on TikTok, should I still post it on Instagram?
Yes: 11% of TikTok flops got twice the creator's usual on Instagram.
Images to post, repost and embed
Free to use under CC BY 4.0. Keep the credit on the image, and link to yapanddone.com/studies/tiktok-and-instagram when you can. Feed cards are 4:5 for Instagram and LinkedIn; story cards are 9:16 for TikTok, Reels and Stories.
Charts for articles
A 30-second script from this study
Free to use for your own TikTok, Reel or Short. Please keep the credit on screen.
Hook (first 2 seconds): Does posting your TikToks on Instagram get you punished?
The number: We matched 10,512 videos creators posted on both apps. On Instagram they got +17% views against the same creator's Instagram-only Reels.
Show: The "Videos that got twice the usual on Instagram" chart.
Takeaway: Post it on both. A hit on one app is twice as likely to hit on the other.
On screen: Source: Yap & Done study, yapanddone.com/studies/tiktok-and-instagram
As data: script.json.
More on both apps
Our studies compare TikTok and Instagram on length, posting times and engagement.
How long should your videos actually be? How much of TikTok is luck?How we did it
- Creators: 174 creators in our niches with full back catalogues on both TikTok and Instagram under the same handle, videos posted from January 2025.
- Same video: a TikTok and a Reel from the same creator, within 1 second in length, posted within 3 days, whose written captions share at least half their words (or that both have none). Each Reel is matched once.
- Against the usual: each copy's views divided by the median of the creator's other videos on that app within 30 days. Cross-posted against one-app videos: each video's views against the creator's average on that app, on a log scale.
- Ranges are 95% ranges from resampling creators.
Limitations
- Creators may cross-post the videos they expect to do well, which could make cross-posted videos look better than they would otherwise.
- We can't see watermarks, so we can't test whether uploading a file with the TikTok logo costs views on Instagram.
- Matching by length, time and caption can miss edited versions and very occasionally pair two different videos.
- These creators were found by searching our niches and have accounts on both apps.
Use it, cite it
The aggregated results are free to reuse under CC BY 4.0. Journalists, researchers and AI agents can pull the full numbers below; the plain-text summary contains the whole study.
Cite as
Press questions or a custom cut of the data: contact us. We refresh this study each quarter; this page always shows the latest snapshot.