Reel
A short, vertical, looping video format — Instagram's answer to TikTok — built for discovery beyond your followers.
A reel is a short vertical video, typically set to music or trending audio, that loops and lives in its own feed. It's Instagram's name for the format; Facebook uses it too, and the same shape powers TikTok and YouTube Shorts.
Reels are weighted toward discovery — the algorithm pushes them to non-followers far more than a carousel or a story — which makes them the workhorse for reach. The first second is the hook, and watch-through time is the single biggest input to engagement rate and onward distribution.
See also