Simpleembed

Get started

Guide

Getting started

This walkthrough takes you from a fresh account to a live Instagram feed on your website. It takes a few minutes, and everything here works on the free plan.

1. Create your account

Sign up with your email address. A workspace is created for you automatically — it holds your connected sources, feeds, shareable auth link, and billing. The free plan includes 1 connected source and 1 feed (with a small Simpleembed watermark).

2. Connect an Instagram source

In the dashboard, open Sources and choose Connect Instagram under "Direct connect". You will continue to Instagram, approve access, and land back in the dashboard with the source ready to use.

Due to the Instagram API rules, a Business or Creator (professional) account is required. Personal Instagram accounts cannot be connected.

Connecting an account that belongs to a client instead? Send them your workspace's shareable auth link — they connect their own account without needing a Simpleembed login. See Client connections.

3. Create a feed

Open Feedsin the dashboard. Pick the source the feed should pull from, give it a name (for example "Homepage feed"), and choose an output:

  • Widget — the ready-made grid or carousel you embed with a script tag.
  • JSON — a raw data endpoint for building a fully custom front-end.

One source can power multiple feeds, so you can run different layouts on different pages from the same account (plan limits permitting).

4. Customize the widget

On the feed card, open Customize. A live preview sits next to the controls, and saving updates every embed instantly. You can tune:

  • Layout — Grid or Carousel.
  • Columns — 1 to 6.
  • Gap — 0 to 48px between tiles.
  • Corner radius — 0 to 32px.
  • Post count — 1 to 50 posts.
  • Show captions — toggle captions on or off.
  • Hover effect — None, Zoom, or Fade.

5. Embed it on your site

Open Embed codeon the feed card and copy the snippet. Paste it into your site's HTML where the feed should appear:

<script src="https://simpleembed.com/embed.js" data-feed-id="FEED_ID" async></script>

Replace FEED_IDwith your feed's ID — the snippet in the dialog already has it filled in. The script injects an auto-resizing iframe, so the feed always matches its content height. For the direct iframe option and the JSON API, see Embedding & API.

6. Keep it in sync

Connected sources sync automatically about once a day, so new Instagram posts show up in your embeds without any action from you. Need a post to appear right away? Use Sync now on the source in the dashboard.