Instagram Sponsored Post Rate Calculator
Calculate how much to charge for Instagram sponsored posts and Stories based on your follower count, engagement rate, and niche.
The industry baseline
The widely-cited starting point for Instagram sponsored posts: $100 per 10,000 followers for a feed post. This is the floor, not the ceiling. Engagement rate and niche routinely multiply this by 2-3x for accounts that perform.
feed post rate = (followers ÷ 10,000) × $100 × engagement multiplier × niche multiplier
Engagement rate is more important than follower count
Engagement rate is the percentage of followers who like, comment, save, or share an average post. It’s the single biggest predictor of whether a sponsored post actually drives sales.
| Engagement rate | What it means | Multiplier |
|---|---|---|
| Under 1% | Bought followers or fully cold audience | ×0.5 to 0.7 |
| 1 to 3% | Average for accounts under 100k | ×1.0 |
| 3 to 6% | Above average, engaged | ×1.5 |
| 6 to 10% | Highly engaged | ×2.0 |
| Over 10% | Micro-influencer with cult following | ×2.5 to 3.0 |
Most accounts over 500k followers drop below 1% engagement because the algorithm can’t show every post to every follower. A 50k-follower micro-influencer at 8% engagement often outperforms a 1M-follower mega-influencer at 0.7% engagement for niche product sales.
Niche premium
Some niches command higher rates because conversion rates on sales are higher:
| Niche | Multiplier |
|---|---|
| Tech / SaaS / B2B | ×1.5 |
| Finance / investing | ×1.5 |
| Health / fitness / wellness | ×1.3 |
| Beauty / cosmetics | ×1.2 |
| Fashion | ×1.2 |
| Food / cooking | ×1.0 |
| Travel | ×1.0 |
| General lifestyle | ×1.0 |
| Comedy / entertainment | ×0.8 (hard to convert to product sales) |
Format multipliers
Different content formats have different rates because of production effort and reach:
- Feed post: baseline (1.0x)
- Story (per frame): 0.3 × feed post rate
- Reel: 1.5 × feed post rate (higher reach, more production)
- Carousel post: 1.2 × feed post rate (drives more engagement than single image)
- Live mention: 0.5 × feed post rate (lower production, lower retention)
- Bundle package (1 post + 3 stories + 1 reel): typically 2.4x feed rate (slight discount for the bundle)
A working example
A 50k-follower beauty account at 4% engagement:
- Base: 5 × $100 = $500
- Engagement multiplier (3-6%): ×1.5 = $750
- Niche multiplier (beauty): ×1.2 = $900 per feed post
- Story (per frame): ×0.3 = $270
- Reel: ×1.5 = $1,350
- Bundle (1 post + 3 stories + 1 reel): $900 + $810 + $1,350 = $3,060
What inflates rates beyond the formula
- Conversion track record. “Last campaign delivered 12,000 link clicks and 340 sales” doubles your rate immediately.
- Specific audience targeting. A 30k-follower account that’s 80% female, 25-34, in the US is worth more to a beauty brand than a 100k account spread across 50 countries.
- Exclusivity. “I won’t post a competitor for 90 days after your campaign” is worth 30 to 50% more.
- Content rights for paid ads. Brand wants to run your content as a paid ad on their account = double the rate.
- Brand fit / scarcity. Saying no to most sponsorships builds the price for the ones you accept.
What deflates rates
- Buying followers / engagement. Brands run analytics. The day you bought 10k Indonesian followers, your future rate drops 50%.
- Inconsistent posting. Brands want recently active accounts. Two weeks dark drops your value.
- High follower-to-engagement gap. Spotted instantly by tools like HypeAuditor and Modash.
- Comment quality. “🔥🔥🔥” comments from bots vs real “Just bought this!” comments. Brands read your comment threads.
Honest income reality
A 10k-follower account at 3% engagement in a strong niche: $100 to $250 per sponsored post, perhaps 1-2 sponsorships/month = $1,200 to $6,000/year as a side income.
A 100k-follower fitness account at 5% engagement: $1,500 to $3,000 per sponsorship, 4 to 8 per month = $72,000 to $288,000/year.
Most accounts under 50k followers do not earn meaningful sponsorship income unless engagement is well above average for the niche.
Disclosure (FTC rule, US)
US Federal Trade Commission requires sponsored posts to use #ad or #sponsored prominently — not buried in 30 hashtags at the bottom. “Paid partnership with [Brand]” via Instagram’s built-in label is the cleanest method. Failure to disclose is an FTC violation with fines up to $50,000 per occurrence in serious cases.