Your Instagram bio is your chance to introduce your brand on Instagram. It’s a small space, but when used effectively it can be very powerful.
In this post we’ll look at some great Instagram bio examples and give you all the tips you need to create one of your own.
What is an Instagram bio?
An Instagram bio is the 150-character description under your username on your Instagram profile page. Your photos show users what you do. Your bio is your chance to tell them who you are.
Your Instagram bio needs to convey your brand personality and show your audience they have come to the right place. After reading your bio, people should understand what you do and why they should follow you.
That’s a lot to ask of such a small amount of text. You’ll need to employ some creative Instagram bio ideas to make your bio stand out.
What makes a good Instagram bio?
The best bio for Instagram is one that helps compel new profile visitors to stick around and click the follow button. When thinking about what to put in your Instagram bio, ask yourself the following questions:
- What is your brand promise?
- How about your brand personality: Funny? Serious? Informative? Playful?
- What are your special skills?
- Are you a local business? National? Multinational?
- What makes your product or service unique?
- What is the first thing you want people to do after they visit your profile?
On that last point: All good marketing material includes a clear and compelling call to action. Your Instagram bio is no exception. Give visitors clear direction.
You might want to use your Instagram link in bio to send people to a page where they can buy your products. But you might have a different conversion goal in mind. Maybe you want people to Like your Facebook page or sign up for your newsletter.
If your goal is to build an Instagram following, your call to action might be simply to ask visitors to follow your feed, or to share their photos with a branded hashtag.
Cool Instagram bio ideas
Still not sure where to start? Here are some cool Instagram bio ideas to model.
1. Funny Instagram bios
While it won’t work for every brand, sometimes humor can be a great way to break the ice.
Old Spice uses humor that aligns with their well-known ad campaigns. “MUSCLES. SMELLS.” Yup, that’s Old Spice in a nutshell.
Source: @oldspice on Instagram
Totinos takes a different approach, using a funny character in their bio. (We’ll admit we had to say “Pete Zaroll” out loud before we got the joke.)
Source: @totinos on Instagram
Notice that neither of these funny Instagram bios says directly what the company does. You can only get away with this if you’re a really well-known brand. But you can always play with humor in less extreme ways if that suits your brand personality.
Source: @friskies on Instagram
2. Instagram bio quotes
Using Instagram bio quotes can be a great way to express an idea or create a feeling of connection.
You could use a saying, a line from a poem or song, or any phrase that will mean something to potential followers. Just make sure to give credit where credit is due if you use someone else’s words.
The Quotations Page is a good place to start your search for good Instagram bio quotes.
Here are 15 quote ideas you can copy and paste directly into your Instagram bio.
- Happiness depends upon ourselves – Aristotle
- I’d rather regret the things I’ve done than regret the things I haven’t done – Lucille Ball
- It is not enough that we do our best; sometimes we must do what’s required – Winston Churchill
- The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing – Walt Disney
- Imagination is more important than knowledge – Albert Einstein
- Energy and persistence conquer all things – Benjamin Franklin
- You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take – Wayne Gretzky
- Cherish forever what makes you unique, cuz you’re really a yawn if it goes – Bette Midler
- If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one – Dolly Parton
- The only impossible journey is the one you never begin – Tony Robbins
- Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game – Babe Ruth
- Action is eloquence – William Shakespeare
- A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval – Mark Twain
- You can be the lead in your own life – Kerry Washington
- When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful – Malala Yousafzai
3. Creative Instagram bios
If you want to stand out from the crowd, and it makes sense for your brand personality, you can get creative with tricks like emojis and puns.
MeUndies uses a clever pun and a cheeky peach to highlight their brand promise, while Wendy’s goes all-emoji to let you know that their Insta feed is all burgers, all the time.
Source: @meundies on Instagram
Source: @wendys on Instagram
We’ll go into more detail on tricks you can use to make your Instagram bio stand out later in this post.
4. Cool Instagram bios
Some brands are all about playing it cool, and they extend that outlook to their Instagram bios.
CitizenM identifies itself as a misfit—a classic cool-kid move—while Ben & Jerry’s riffs on a lyric from a 1979 Elvis Costello song.
Source: @citizenm on Instagram
Source: @benandjerrys on Instagram
5. Short Instagram bios
If you can sum up what you do and what your Instagram feed is all about in just a few words, there’s no harm in doing so.
Instagram bios are not searchable, which means you don’t need to include any keywords in your bio, and nothing you write in your bio will boost your profile in Instagram search results.
(To learn more about the parts of your profile that are searchable and learn how to make your Instagram account more discoverable, check out our post on how to get followers on Instagram.)
The Oatmeal and The Globe and Mail both take a factual approach to the short Instagram bio game. The Oatmeal takes a more casual tone. The Globe highlights its achievements in a few words that get straight to the point.
Source: @theoatmeal on Instagram
Source: @globeandmail on Instagram
You can also use your mission or value statement or your tagline as a short Instagram bio. In this case, it’s a good idea to add some secondary information like a hashtag, link, or or call to action.
Apple uses its short Instagram bio to encourage followers to share content (more on this below). Bumble sticks to its well-known tagline.
Source: @apple on Instagram
Source: @bumble on Instagram
6. Clever Instagram bios
When creating a creative Instagram bio, make sure you strike the right balance. You want to be clever, but not too clever. You don’t want to alienate potential followers by being over the top.
John Fluevog Shoes makes a clever play on words that’s right in line with the brand’s playful approach to footwear. Hulu draws attention with, well, a call to attention. It’s a clever Instagram bio for a brand whose product offering is all about holding the rapt attention of its customers.
Source: @fluevog on Instagram
Source: @hulu on Instagram
7. Instagram bios with emoji
Emojis convey a lot of information in just one character. They’re a great way to highlight your brand personality and provide key details when creating a short bio for Instagram.
Emojis are also a great way to break your instagram bio up visually. They make a great substitute for bullet points.
Here are a couple of good instagram bios to model using this technique, from two wildly different sources. Alexandra Gater is a home decor YouTuber, while the NFL is, well, the NFL. If this technique can work for these two very different accounts, it can work for anyone.
Source: @alexandragater on Instagram
Source: @nfl on Instagram
You can also use emojis for emphasis, or just to add a bit of personality to your bio, like Victoria Emerson Designs does here.
Source: @victoriaemersondesign on Instagram
Here are some common Instagram bio emojis for you to copy and paste:
- ????: Use in front of your physical location or address
- ???? : Use in front of your email address
- ????: Use in the last line of your bio to point to your clickable URL
- ????: To draw attention
- ✈️: Commonly used by travel brands
- ???? : To call attention to you YouTube channel
- ????: To indicate an achievement or award
- ✨: Also used to indicate an achievement, or just to show off your “sparkle”
- Flags: Can be a great way to indicate your home base, or to highlight your local brand accounts in different languages or countries.
8. Instagram business bios
Great Instagram business bios tell potential followers exactly what your brand is all about so they know why they should follow and what to expect when they do.
All three of the Instagram business bios here also include a branded hashtag, which can be a good way to build a community for your brand on Instagram. We’ll go into more detail on that aspect of Instagram business bios below.
Source: @herschelsupply on Instagram
Source: @article on Instagram
Source: @plantsome_ca on Instagram
Tricks to make a cool bio for Instagram
Now that you’ve got plenty of Instagram bio examples to model, let’s look at some tricks to make your bio stand out.
9. Change your Instagram bio font
Technically, you can only use one “font” in your Instagram bio. But there are tools out there that will help you create the look of a custom font by mapping your text to existing special characters.
Here’s what my own Instagram bio looks like in a few different fonts, as created using the tool Instagram Fonts.
That third one is a little bonkers, but you could pick and choose a few words to incorporate strategically for visual appeal. In general, it’s a good idea to use this trick sparingly, for emphasis, rather than dressing your entire bio up in fancy fonts.
Once you find a font style you like, just copy-and-paste it into your Instagram bio.
10. Use Instagram bio symbols
We’ve already talked about using emojis. But you can also go old-school and use special text symbols to break ★ up ★ your ★ bio. (Remember Wingdings and Webdings? How very 1990s.)
This trick uses the same principle as the tip above, but instead of using symbols to create the look of a custom font, you can use them as retro emojis or unique bullet points:
Source: @blogger on Instagram
The easiest way to find your special character is to open a new Google Doc, then click Insert and choose Special characters.
Source: Google Docs
You can scroll through the available options, search by keyword, or even draw a shape to find a similar character. Then, just copy and paste into your Instagram bio.
11. Add a category
If you have a business profile on Instagram, you can choose a category for your business. This appears under your name and can help people see at a glance what you do.
Source: @jacksonhole on Instagram
Using a category for your business can free up space in your Instagram bio, since you don’t need to repeat this information. However, it only appears in the mobile view, so you can’t assume everyone will see it.
For tricks 11 through 14, you need to edit your profile using the Instagram app, rather than your computer. From your profile page, click Edit Profile, then scroll down to Public Business Information.
Source: Instagram
12. Add contact buttons
Business profiles can include contact buttons that allow people to phone you, email you, or get directions to your business directly from Instagram.
Source: @hootsuite on Instagram
13. Add a call-to-action button
You can encourage people to take action straight from your Instagram bio with CTA buttons. These allow your followers to take direct actions like ordering food from your restaurant, or buying tickets for your event.
Source: @hawksworthrest on Instagram
You’ll find these options under Action Buttons when editing your business profile.
14. Add your location
When you add your address to your Instagram business profile, it also appears below your bio but does not use up any of your bio character count. This is another great way to free up space for more compelling bio information.
Source: @ontariotravel on Instagram
You don’t have to include your full address here if you don’t want to. You can just include your city, if that’s what you prefer.
15. Add a link in bio
You get one clickable link in your Instagram bio. Since you can’t use clickable links in Instagram feed posts (unless you’re using Instagram ads or Instagram Shopping), your bio link is valuable real estate.
You can change the URL as often as you like. You might want to link to your newest or most important content (like your latest blog post or video), a special campaign, or a landing page specifically for visitors coming from Instagram.
You can also use Instagram tools such as Linktree to set up a mobile landing page with multiple links, so you don’t have to keep updating the link in your Instagram bio, which can lead to outdated “link in bio” statements on older posts.
We’re now back into the territory of Instagram bio details that are available in both desktop and mobile view.
Source: @rarebeauty in Instagram
Wondering how to put a link in your Instagram bio? Just enter the link you want to use in the Website field in your profile.
16. Include hashtags
Hashtags in your Instagram bio are clickable links. Keep in mind, though, that Instagram bios do not appear in hashtag search results. Adding hashtags to your bio won’t make it more discoverable.
That means you should not include hashtags unless they are directly related to your business, because each one represents an opportunity for potential followers to click away.
However, adding a branded hashtag to your bio is a great way to promote and collect user-generated content.
This is one of the best ways for businesses to use hashtags in their bio. When a user clicks on the hashtag, they will see all the content your fans and followers have posted, which creates excellent social proof for your business.
Source: @zappos on Instagram
17. Add line breaks
People don’t tend to read information online. Instead, they scan for bite-sized chunks of information.
Make that information easy to identify using line breaks.
Old Navy uses a combination of emojis and line breaks to create this cute Instagram bio:
Source: @oldnavy on Instagram
It’s really easy to add line breaks using the Instagram web interface. Simply space your bio as you would like it to appear.
On mobile, your best bet is to create your bio with the spacing you want using a notes app. Then, copy and paste it into your Instagram bio field. Or, use one of the Instagram bio templates below.
Instagram bio templates
Still not sure what to include in your Instagram bio? We’ve created some social media bio templates, including Instagram bio templates, to get you started.
Manage your Instagram presence alongside your other social channels and save time using Hootsuite. From a single dashboard, you can schedule and publish posts, engage the audience, and measure performance. Try it free today.
Easily create, analyze, and schedule Instagram posts with Hootsuite. Save time and get results.
