How to Find Trending Instagram Hashtags in 2025?

Hashtags revolutionized social media. It’s much easier to find relevant content on Instagram, isn’t it? I honestly can’t imagine Instagram without hashtags. But to realize their potential, we need to use them in the right way. So, how to find trending hashtags on Instagram in 2025? And how to maximize their potential?

I already know. And so will you after reading this article!

Finding trending hashtags on Instagram is crucial for boosting content visibility and reaching a wider audience. You can use the Instagram app to browse hashtags manually or use advanced tools to make it more efficient. Balancing niche, branded, and trending tags ensures better engagement and avoids oversaturation in crowded hashtag spaces.

Ready? Let’s explore the 7 steps to efficiently finding (and using) trending Instagram hashtags!

Introduction to hashtags

So why not start with a tidbit? Below, you can see what the very first hashtag looked like:

Source: https://twitter.com/chrismessina/status/223115412

Yep, it was shared on Twitter in 2007.

Since that day, hashtags have made massive changes all over social media. They’re now implemented across the most popular platforms, including:

• Facebook
• X (Twitter)
• LinkedIn
• TikTok
• YouTube

The biggest impact they actually have is on Instagram, TikTok and Twitter.

And what will you need to find Instagram hashtags?

The Instagram app, of course (I know, that’s basic). But that should be enough for the beginning.

However, keep in mind that to put your hashtag strategy to the next level – you will need external tools. I’ll give you a brief overview of the most popular ones.

So, with that being covered – let’s begin!

How does the Instagram hashtag work?

On Instagram, hashtags are kind of your “to be or not to be” – they make your content discoverable and can increase the social media reach of your posts.

In general, they aim to categorize content.

They even have their own “feed”. Plus, people can follow the hashtag, which makes the algorithm push more content, including the tag in their “Explore” pages.

What does it mean for you, a marketer? Relevant hashtags can make your content visible to a wider audience.

Therefore, hashtags are one of the best ways to grow your Instagram profile.

How it works? Hashtags are clickable. Users who click on a hashtag on Instagram posts or type it in a search will see a page showing content tagged with that particular hashtag:

That’s the power of them!

We can use hashtags on posts, Stories, and Reels. If you tag your content with the proper hashtag, it will appear on the hashtag page.

Here’s what happens when you add hashtags on Instagram Stories – they’re also added to the hashtags page:

Pro tip: Many brands create their own hashtags to engage followers and build a wide online community.

Adidas does it well. Their branded hashtag #ImpossibleIsNothing, has already reached over 547k posts.

Adidas branded hashtag

My advice is to track the performance of branded hashtags.

It enables you to learn:

• How your community grows over time
• Which actions worked well & things you may not want to continue
• Audience sentiment toward your brand or specific topics
• Opportunities for user-generated content and collaborations

Unfortunately, Instagram does not give us extended analytics. The only thing you can do within the app is check how many times the hashtags were used.

You can do that by typing the phrase in the search bar. The related hashtags will appear below and include the usage insights under each of them:

But, to analyze your branded hashtag campaign, you can use a hashtag tracker that will bring you much more data.

How to find trending hashtags on Instagram in 2025?

The first thought that probably comes to your mind is to start your Instagram hashtag search inside an Instagram mobile app.

That’s a good lead.

But Instagram gives us a few ways to discover what is trending. Doing it manually is not the only way. I will show you some interesting tools and apps worth using.

Let’s begin!

01 Check the Instagram’s Explore Page

Explore Page is driven by the Instagram algorithm.

It is a collection of posts and reels generated based on data about

• Your reactions (also the time you spend looking at a specific post)
• Followers
• Accounts you are following
• Search history (also on Facebook and threads)

You can see here content related to your specific interests. Everyone sees it differently.

It can be a place to search for hashtags, but you will have to do it manually.

You’ll need to click on each post and check their description… So, it will be time-consuming and definitely biased.

That’s why the Explore page might not be your friend here.

However, the thing about the Explore page is that getting your content there is a huge, huge, huge booster in reaching a wider audience, so let’s not kill it entirely.

It’s just a little tricky.

02 Check the hashtag autocomplete feature

Instagram has a search engine.

You can use it to search:

• Accounts
• Audio (sounds)
• Places
• Tags
• Reels
• & Not personalized content

Anyone can use it to search for hashtags related to their interests.

While typing, the search engine also shows similar, popular hashtags:

An important note is that this feature suggests highly popular hashtags with millions of posts.

Well, using such a popular tag has two faces. One positive and one negative.

Which one do you want first?

Well, the good thing is that content with popular hashtags is pushed to a ton of people.

The bad one – only the best ones get this attention. It’s hard to notice, and the chance that your content will disappear from the crowd is very high.

Using related hashtags can enhance Instagram engagement and reach, especially for businesses and influencers.

03 Use the social listening tool

My personal tip is to use a social listening tool to discover new hashtags.

It can be very effective in finding the tags that are highly related and dedicated to your business.

How does such a tool work?

In general, social listening tools collect real-time mentions of predefined keywords from all over the web.

You can monitor literally any keyword. Here are a few examples of what you might track:

• The name of your company brand, product, or service
• Your branded hashtags
• Your campaign-specific hashtag
• Your CEO’s name or any other prominent team member
• Keywords related to your business niche
• Keywords that might be trending in the future

Based on that data, the tool defines the most popular hashtags related to your business.

I’ll show you based on a Brand24 example.

The process here is very simple.

1. You establish your keyword and set up the project.
2. Go to the Analytics Tab and look for “Trending hashtags.”

These hashtags are based on what tags people use when talking about your brand.

3. You can analyze each of them further by clicking on the blue icon on the right.

It takes you to a very detailed analysis, where you can monitor:

• The volume of mentions of the hashtag over time
• The reach it generates over time
• The sentiment around it over time

You can also filter it in terms of:

• The platform
• The location
• Language
• Author
• & more!

Brand24 updates the data once per hour. That’s the big advantage of this tool. You don’t have to waste your time searching hashtags on your Instagram feed. The tool does all the work for you.

Set up Brand24, find trending hashtags, and expand your brand awareness on Instagram!

04 Follow relevant hashtags

Of course, you can follow Instagram users, but did you know that you can also track hashtags?

Yep, you can click “Follow” and it will add this topic as your interest for the algorithm.

It used to be a simple thing, and the hashtag worked similarly to a regular profile. After following you were shown the posts from it on your home page.

But it changed when Instagram split the home page into the “Following” and “For You” pages.

Following the hashtag now only impacts your algorithm and won’t add posts to any of your pages.

So what does it do? You’ll be much more likely to get content related to the hashtag you followed on the “Explore” page.

It seems like it doesn’t even have to be tagged with this specific hashtag. Just simply related in terms of topic.

This is what following a hashtag on Instagram looks like now:

05 Follow relevant influencers

Influencers create trends on Instagram. That’s a fact. So why don’t you check what hashtags they use? There is nothing wrong with following their steps.

Instagram Stories can also contain hashtags. So do not forget to look at them too.

Those influencers should feel what kind of content their audience wants to consume. So it’s essential to pick the right ones.

Brand24 detects the top and most active public profiles related to you.

I think this list can be very helpful in finding Instagram influencers.

This is what it looks like for Tidal:

I filtered the results to get only the Instagram profiles, but you can access the Influencer analysis from all available sources:

06 Use niche-specific hashtags lists

You can easily access lists of trending hashtags on Instagram for a specific niche.

Either by searching it online or doing your own analysis.

Keep in mind that those kinds of lists contain highly popular tags used by millions of users.

As I mentioned before, it’s not always a good idea to add them to your Instagram posts. Furthermore, it’s hard to verify whether the lists are updated and trustworthy.

Still, many people search for the most popular hashtags on Google.

I created my own lists for some of the most popular industries – slide to the “Top Instagram hashtags” paragraph for them.

I also explain there how to make your own Instagram hashtag list based on actual data.

07 Use mobile apps

App Stores are full of mobile apps that generate popular hashtags for social media platforms.

There are many mobile apps that prompt trending hashtags:

I tested 3 hashtag generator mobile apps: In Tags, Leetags, and Hashtags – Hashtag Manager.

The first two are paid, and Hashtag Manager is a free tool.

Here are my thoughts:

Those mobile apps are based on the same features. You can search hashtags by category or generate them by typing keywords.

What’s important is that you can filter the hashtags by the number of uses.

I found this feature very helpful. Usually, free versions of hashtag generator mobile apps are full of ads that pop up full screen.

They work pretty nicely if you are looking for popular or the most popular hashtags. But will they detect that some hashtags are trending and gathering more and more interest of Instagram users?

No, they don’t.

Mobile apps simply list hashtags by popularity and help you categorize your hashtags into groups. That’s all.

You can also determine how many hashtags you want to generate.

The only feature I found interesting was the “reliability” scoring in Leetags:

It could be helpful to create the most relevant list possible.

Mobile apps vs. Social listening tools

Which one will be better in searching for the most popular Instagram hashtags?

I’ve deepened my research and tried to find trending hashtags for my company, Brand24. Here are the results:

• In Tags app proposed hashtags related to digital marketing
• Leetags app did the same as In Tags
• Hashtags – Hashtag Manager app suggested hashtags containing the word brand

As you can see, it’s very hard to discover accurate tags for brands from less popular industries.

Now, let’s take a look at data generated by the social listening tool Brand24.

The tool suggested hashtags related to the business niche:

• social listening
• digital marketing
• social media
• social media marketing
• marketing

The results are much more accurate. Data is updated once per hour, so you can detect what’s trending almost in real-time.

Trending Instagram hashtags for 2025

As we discussed before – using top trending hashtags on Instagram can have both advantages and disadvantages.

The most popular hashtags have a lot of users following and interacting with them, which can increase the visibility of your posts to a larger audience.

On the other hand, top hashtags are often oversaturated with content, making it difficult for your post to stand out and actually get noticed.

So is it worth to use them?

The best approach is to balance top hashtags with niche and branded hashtags specifically tailored to your audience, which will provide the most sustainable results.

Here’s a list of top Instagram hashtags detected by the Brand24 tool:

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for fashion

1. #fashion
2. #style
3. #love
4. #instagood
5. #instagram
6. #photography
7. #follow
8. #art
9. #like
10. #beautiful
11. #photooftheday
12. #fyp
13. #trending
14. #viral
15. #instadaily
16. #design
17. #picoftheday
18. #outfit
19. #followforfollowback
20. #likeforlikes

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for beauty

1. #beauty
2. #love
3. #fashion
4. #makeup
5. #beautiful
6. #skincare
7. #instagood
8. #photography
9. #style
10. #instagram
11. #model
12. #art
13. #photooftheday
14. #cute
15. #fyp
16. #viral
17. #follow
18. #trending
19. #nature
20. travel

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for travel

1. #travel
2. #photography
3. #love
4. #nature
5. #instagood
6. #travelphotography
7. #instagram
8. #photooftheday
9. #beautiful
10. #trending
11. #art
12. #viral
13. #explore
14. #fashion
15. #fyp
16. #photo
17. #picoftheday
18. #lifestyle
19. #happy
20. #beauty

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for fitness

1. #fitness
2. #gym
3. #motivation
4. #workout
5. #fitnessmotivation
6. #fit
7. #love
8. #lifestyle
9. #health
10. #instagood
11. #bodybuilding
12. #instagram
13. #fashion
14. #training
15. #gymmotivation
16. #healthy
17. #healthylifestyle
18. #follow
19. #sport
20. #photography

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for restaurants

1. #restaurants
2. #food
3. #foodie
4. #restaurant
5. #travel
6. #dinner
7. #coffee
8. #chef
9. #pizza
10. #beauty
11. #suppliers
12. #breakfast
13. #vegan
14. #cocktails
15. #eat
16. #hotels
17. #italy
18. #foodporn
19. #fyp
20. #foodlover

Top 20 Instagram hashtags for technology

1. #technology
2. #ai
3. #tech
4. #cybersecurity
5. #innovation
6. #business
7. #artificialintelligence
8. #news
9. #coding
10. #technews
11. #programming
12. #blockchain
13. #infosec
14. #software
15. #hacking
16. #engineering
17. #security
18. #apple
19. #linux
20. #python

How did I get them?

It’s pretty simple. You need to set up a social listening project for your niche. The tool will analyze mentions from all over the web and find the most commonly used hashtags during those conversations.

You’ll find them in the “Analytics” Tab > Trending hashtags.

It’s a great way to determine popular Instagram hashtags that will stay relevant to your topic.

Of course, it would be best to re-do the process from time to time, as online conversations are ever-changing. This way, you ensure you know what hashtags are trending on Instagram right now.

Best practices for Instagram hashtags in 2025

Finding trending hashtags is just half the story – another important part is how to use them properly. As Instagram’s algorithm changes from time to time, the Internet is full of questions and tips on how to use hashtags.

I know that social media are dynamic, and so are the hashtag strategies.

But there are some more timeless tips.

Here’s my list of 10 tips

01 Avoid popular and too general hashtags

If too many people use a hashtag, it’s hard to gain broad reach.

The algorithm won’t favor your post for that hashtag. It’s much better to use a combination of trending/popular + relevant hashtags.

I get the hype over those numbers – “#fyp” has over 474M posts, but look at what kind of content is there. Spammy, and without any particular topic.

02 Avoid random hashtags, use relevant ones

Using super trending hashtags is tempting but if irrelevant to your photo, they might do more bad than good. Instagram’s algorithm treats irrelevant hashtags as spam which may result in shadowban.

Using relevant hashtags adds your content to the right group where people who look for certain topics can find you.

Just like it happens with #interiordesign. It still has a lot of volume but is much more specific:

03 Use niche hashtags

Using niche hashtags will bring a highly targeted audience – they will drive quality engagement on your profile.

Plus, it’s easier to get noticed in a less crowded space.

Let’s say I’m looking for a new bed for my dog. I’d very likely browse Instagram and look for #dogbeds.

This hashtag is perfect – niche, with a relatively high volume but not too big:

As you can see, it was doable for a brand with dog beds to get to the top of this hashtags page and offer their product:

04 Don’t overuse your hashtags

If you post often, make sure you change hashtags but always keep them relevant and as trending as possible.

Yes, it might be hard.

But otherwise, Instagram’s algorithm might recognize you as a spammer.

05 Add trending hashtags to Instagram Stories and Reels

Do not forget to add a trending hashtag to your Stories and Reels. So it will be more visible and pushed to a wider audience.

06 Create branded and campaign hashtags

Using dedicated hashtags for your brand and marketing campaigns is a great way to increase brand awareness and measure the results of Instagram marketing.

You can track the performance of such hashtags with a brand monitoring tool.

It’s very simple – you set up a project for your branded hashtag as a keyword. Just like you do for your brand.

I did it for #SamsungGalaxy and can monitor it’s performance:

07 Create hashtag lists

Make your life easier with a few hashtag lists you will only copy and paste into your Instagram post. Remember to keep the lists fresh and avoid overusing them.

That is where the hashtag generator apps can be useful – to store and update your lists.

08 Use local hashtags for your local business

Local hashtags are the best way to reach an audience near you. The second way is to mark posts and Stories with localization.

09 Track your hashtag performance

Keep an eye on how your hashtags are doing to see what’s working and what’s not.

Social listening tools can help you check things like reach, engagement, and how your audience is reacting. Regularly reviewing this helps you stay on track and keep your hashtag game strong.

Afterschool Alliance used Brand24 to track how their hashtag performs, and that’s their feedback:

How many hashtags should I use on Instagram?

I guess every Instagram user asks this question. There are different theories about the number of hashtags an Instagram post should contain.

The number of hashtags definitely impacts reach. It used to be a big number; posts with 30 Instagram hashtags were getting the most likes and comments.

However, times have changed, and now it’s more about the kind of hashtags you use, not the number.

I suggest using 9-11 hashtags per post.

The mix of highly used ones with niche and relevant hashtags would be best.

Conclusion

Trending Instagram hashtags are super important in digital marketing.

The goal is to place your posts on the Explore Page. 

Why? 

Getting up there means reaching a wider audience and, more importantly – new potential customers.

Your hashtags shouldn’t be guesswork. A well-defined Instagram hashtag strategy can make the whole process much easier and more efficient.

Read more about how to level up your Instagram audit!

Key takeaways:

1. Quality over quantity! You should focus on finding highly relevant tags. This way, you can reach your target audience.
2. Most popular Instagram hashtags can be a trap! It’s hard to get noticed in such a crowded space, while it’s easy to be seen as a spammer.
3. Use tools! Social listening is a fantastic way to discover relevant hashtags and monitor hashtag performance over time.

Want to find trending and regularly updated hashtags? Start with a Brand24 free trial!