Instagram hashtags are words or phrases preceded by # that categorise your post so the algorithm and Instagram search can tell what it is about. When you add #AustinRestaurants to a post, someone searching that term can find you. You could once follow a hashtag as though it were an account, but Instagram removed that in December 2024.
For local businesses, specific hashtags outperform generic ones. #food has over 500 million posts. Yours disappears in seconds. #AustinTexMex has thousands of posts and the people searching it are in your city. That is the audience that matters.
Instagram now caps a post at five hashtags, and posts that go over are pushed down in Explore, hashtag pages and Reels recommendations. The days of a thirty-tag block at the bottom of a caption are over, and they were never as effective as they looked. Adam Mosseri has said plainly that hashtags categorise a post rather than boost its reach.
So a local business gets five, and they should be specific: your city with your business type, your speciality, and your neighbourhood. Prizz writes four into every caption it generates, which leaves you one to add.
Hashtags on review posts work the same way. When you share a Google review on Instagram with relevant local hashtags, people searching for businesses in your area can discover you through the review. See how to promote your business on Instagram for free.