How to Schedule Instagram Reels with Metricool

Posting an Instagram Reel live means filming, editing, writing a caption, picking a cover, finding audio, and tapping through Instagram’s posting flow in one go. Do that two or three times a week and it fills a good part of your schedule. When you schedule Instagram Reels from Metricool, you upload the video, write the caption, attach audio, set your posting options, and pick a publish time from the same planner. That way, a week of Reels fits into one sitting.

Reels also make up a big share of what accounts publish. Of the more than 8 million Instagram posts in Metricool’s Short Video Report 2026, 3.6 million were Reels.

Why Schedule Reels with Metricool (Instead of Meta or Instagram)

If you run one Instagram account and you’re happy posting live, the Instagram app does the job. Metricool starts to make more sense once any of these applies to you:

• You Post to More Than Instagram: Meta Business Suite covers Facebook and Instagram. Metricool adds TikTok, YouTube Shorts, Threads, LinkedIn, Pinterest, X, Bluesky, and more, so every platform sits in one calendar.
• You Want Cross-Platform Analytics: Performance data from every connected platform lands in one dashboard. You can compare a Reel against the same clip on TikTok or Shorts without exporting a report from each app.
• You Manage Clients or a Team: Approval workflows, client dashboards, and white-label reports come built in, so sign-off and reporting happen in the same tool where you plan the content.
• You Plan in Batches: You can sit down once a week and lay out a month of content in the planner. Best Times to Post suggests slots based on your own audience’s activity, so each Reel goes out when your followers are most likely to be online.

Each short video platform does a different job, which is why the same clip is worth sending to more than one. TikTok brings reach, with 42.6% more views per video than Instagram on average across more than 6 million videos. Instagram brings the response. 

Reels collect more shares than TikTok videos or Shorts at every account size, and more comments for every account above 2,000 followers. If you schedule a clip to both from one planner, you get the reach and the response without uploading it twice.

What You Need to Schedule Instagram Reels

Two things have to be in place first:

• A Professional Instagram Account: Metricool schedules and auto-publishes to business and creator accounts. Switching from a personal account takes about a minute in the Instagram app.
• Your Account Connected to Metricool: You can connect through Facebook or Instagram. If you plan to add music to your Reels, connect through Facebook, since audio and a few other features need that connection.

How to Schedule an Instagram Reel in Metricool

Everything happens in the Planner. You upload the video, write the caption, add hashtags and audio, and choose a cover on one screen, then queue the Reel for the slot that fits your calendar.

1. Open Metricool and go to Planning.
2. Click Create new post.
3. Click the Instagram icon and choose Reel from the dropdown.
4. Add your video, write your caption, add hashtags, and preview the Reel.
5. Choose Schedule, Publish now, Save as draft, or Send for review.

Instagram lets you publish up to 50 posts a day across feed posts, Reels, and stories, which leaves plenty of room for a weekly batch.

Adding Trending Audio to Scheduled Reels

Scheduling a Reel from a third-party tool used to mean publishing it without music, then opening the Instagram app to add the song by hand. Since May 2026, you can pick a track in Metricool’s planner and the Reel goes live with it attached. This works for regular Reels and Trial Reels, as long as your Instagram account is connected through Facebook.

To add audio to a scheduled Reel:

1. In Planning, create a new Instagram Reel and upload your video.
2. Add your caption and any other settings, like hashtags or a location.
3. Under Instagram Presets, click Add audio.
4. Search for a song or browse the library, play a track to hear it, then click Save.
5. Pick a date and time, keep Autopublish on, and click Schedule.

You can choose from licensed music in Meta’s library or original sounds that other creators have uploaded.

The audio feature works within a few limits:

• The Audio Library: Metricool shows the tracks that Instagram allows scheduling tools to use, so some songs you see in the app won’t be there.
• The Start Point: Every track starts from the beginning, so pick one whose opening fits your video.
• The Preview: You can listen to each track before you pick it, and you’ll hear it with your video once the Reel is live.
• Web Only: Audio scheduling works in the web version of Metricool, with mobile app support planned for a future update.

You can edit or remove the audio from the planner any time before the Reel publishes. If the song you want isn’t in the library, switch that Reel to manual publishing and add the audio in the Instagram app.

Instagram Presets and Scheduling Options

The Instagram Presets panel holds the settings that change how your Reel appears once it’s live:

• Show Reel on Feed: Turn this on to show the Reel in your main grid as well as the Reels tab.
• Add Collaborator: You can invite up to five public accounts that aren’t age-restricted. Each one has to accept in the Instagram app for the collab tag to appear, and the Reel publishes on schedule either way.
• Boost This Post: Promote the Reel as an ad to reach more people alongside your organic schedule.
• AI-Generated Content: Turn this on to label the Reel as AI-generated when it goes live.
• Add Audio: Add a track from Metricool’s library or upload your own audio file.

The three-dot menu on the video attachment holds the media options:

• Edit Video: Edit the clip in Metricool before you schedule it.
• Tag People: Tag public Instagram accounts in the Reel.
• Tag Products: Tag products from your Instagram account in the Reel.
• Upload Video Thumbnail: Import a custom cover. The recommended size is 1080 x 1800 pixels.
• Select Cover: Use a frame from the video as the cover.
• Tag Audio: Rename your Reel’s own sound, which shows as “Original audio” by default.

How to Schedule Trial Reels

Trial Reels show only to people who don’t follow you, so you can see how new viewers react before the video reaches your followers. While a Trial Reel is in testing, it sits in the drafts section of your profile, where only you can see it. Trial Reels work best when you test one change at a time, like a new hook, a different track, or another posting time.

To schedule a Trial Reel from Metricool:

1. Go to Planning, click Create new post, and select Instagram.
2. Choose Trial Reel in the content type dropdown.
3. Add your caption and upload the video.
4. Turn on Share automatically with everyone if you want the Reel to reach your followers when it performs well in the first 72 hours.
5. Pick a date and time, then schedule the post or save it as a draft.

Auto-Publishing vs. Manual Publishing Reels

Most Reels auto-publish from Metricool. Three cases need manual publishing instead:

• Reels with audio that isn’t in Metricool’s library
• Reels with interactive stickers, such as polls, questions, quizzes, sliders, or countdowns
• Reels that fall outside Instagram’s video specs

To publish manually, turn off Autopublish when you schedule. At publish time, Metricool sends you a notification by email or in the mobile app. Tap it, and Metricool saves the video to your phone, copies the caption, and opens Instagram so you can add the song or sticker there.

Instagram Reel Requirements

Auto-publishing works when your Reel meets Instagram’s specs:

If a Reel fails to auto-publish, check its export settings against this table first.

Preview Your Instagram Feed Before Anything Publishes

Reels appear in your profile grid as well as the Reels tab, so the order and covers of your scheduled content shape how your profile looks. Metricool’s Feed Preview shows your grid with every scheduled Reel in place before any of them go live.

In the Planning view, click the three dots and select Preview feed. Switch between iOS (vertical) and Android/Web (square) to check the grid on each device. Drafts show up faded, so you can tell them apart from posts that are ready to go, and you can edit any scheduled post from the preview.

If you keep a consistent grid, the preview is where you’ll spot a cover that clashes or a post order that needs swapping before your followers see it.

After Your Reels Publish

Metricool starts tracking each Reel as soon as it’s live. The Reels analytics section breaks performance into three views:

• Organic Summary: This view shows engagement rate, total interactions, average reach, video views, and number of Reels for any time period.
• Interaction Breakdown: This view tracks likes, comments, saves, shares, and Reels published over time.
• Individual Reel Performance: This view lists each Reel’s publish date, reach, interactions, engagement, watch time, view rate past three seconds, retention, and reposts.

How Your Reels Compare to Accounts Your Size

Reels engagement holds steady as accounts grow, staying between 3.8% and 4.7% of reach at every account size. Instagram also has higher engagement than TikTok and YouTube Shorts at every size below 1 million followers. These averages come from the Short Video Report 2026, based on 375,462 accounts:

If you check one column against your own numbers, make it shares. At Small accounts, Reels get nine times more shares than YouTube Shorts, and each share sends your video to someone who may not follow you yet.

Replying to Comments on Your Reels

Comments start arriving once a Reel is live, and Metricool Flows can reply to them for you. With the Turn comments into DMs template, someone who comments a keyword like GUIDE on your Reel gets a public reply and a DM asking for a quick reaction. Once they react or reply, a second DM sends your link. You can set the Flow up on a Reel that’s still in your schedule, so replies start as soon as it publishes.

Make Metricool Part of Your Reels Routine

Reels reward accounts that post on a steady schedule, at the times their audience is online, with a plan behind each video. That’s a lot to keep up when every Reel depends on you holding your phone at 11pm on a Sunday, waiting for the upload to go through.

With Metricool, you can schedule a week of Reels in one sitting across your best posting times. Audio goes on in the planner, the same clips go out to TikTok and Shorts, Flows answers the keyword comments, and every result lands in one dashboard.