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A comment funnel is the classic Instagram mechanic: post a Reel, say “comment LINK and I’ll send it”, and the DM goes out on its own — optionally after asking the commenter to follow you first. It exists because the people this is for have never messaged you. A comment is not a conversation, so automations cannot reach them; a private reply can, and that is what a funnel spends. Channels → Instagram → Comment funnels is the list and the results. Channels → Instagram → Posts opens the same editor from a post. There is one editor and one underlying record — the Posts page calls it “an automation” because that is what you are thinking about while looking at a post.

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Two switches, always

Nothing goes out unless both agree:
  1. Comment funnels — the workspace-wide switch at the top of this page (and of the Posts page). Off means no funnel runs, whatever its own setting says.
  2. The funnel’s own switch, in the list and on the last step of the editor.
A funnel that is on while the master switch is off shows as Blocked rather than Live, with the reason in its tooltip.

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Starting one

New funnel opens a gallery of ready-made wordings. Each tile also shows the caption line it is designed to pair with — “Comment LINK and I’ll send it over” — because the caption is the other half of the setup, and a funnel whose post never tells anyone what to comment gets zero runs and no error.
No template is ever armed. Every one of them, and every funnel you duplicate, is saved switched off. You turn it on at the last step once the wording reads the way you want — the first DM is not something you can take back.

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The editor

The editor is a step rail, not a form, because a funnel is a sequence the commenter experiences in order. The rail is on the left, the step you are editing in the middle, and a phone preview on the right showing that step ringed inside the whole exchange. Below lg the rail becomes a stepper and the preview moves behind a Preview button. Each step carries its own state in the rail: done, still to do, needs attention, or deliberately off. Off is not a gap — the public reply and the follow ask are genuinely skippable and the rail does not nag about them.

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Trigger

Choose Specific words or Any comment. Words are matched anywhere in the comment and case-insensitively, so “LINK please” matches link. Put the same word in your caption. On the Comment funnels page you can also choose the post: one post, or All posts — every post, present and future. A funnel for one post beats the all-posts funnel, so both can run at once with the all-posts one as the fallback. Opening the editor from a post does not offer the picker — “automate this post” already carries the answer.

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Public reply

A reply posted publicly under the comment, so everyone else reading knows commenting works. Add several wordings and they are rotated one at a time.
Add at least two. Hundreds of identical replies under one post is exactly what Instagram’s spam filters look for, and the editor flags a single wording as needing attention.

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Opening DM

The first message and the button under it. This step cannot be skipped. Instagram will not tell anyone whether a commenter follows you until that person has messaged you — a comment does not count — so this message and its button exist to produce that first tap. Everything after it depends on it. Wait before answering sets a delay before the DM goes out: Immediate, 10 sec, 30 sec or 1 min. Answering within a second is the tell that a robot did it. Messages are capped at 1,000 characters and button labels at 20 — Meta’s limits.

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Follow ask

Optional, and shown only to people who do not already follow you. It is a nudge, not a gate: the link is sent either way when they tap, so a follow status that is slow to update never costs you the lead. The message they came for, plus up to 3 link buttons — Instagram will not render more. Each button needs a label and a URL starting with http:// or https://. Leave the buttons empty to send the message on its own.

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Name & go live

The name is only ever seen by you; it is how you will find this funnel in a list in six weeks. The switch below it arms the funnel.

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The readiness panel

Under the rail is a list that answers “why isn’t this running?” without reading a log. It mirrors the checks the runtime makes, in the order it makes them:
  1. Instagram connected — nothing runs without it.
  2. Comment automations switched on — the master switch.
  3. This automation is on — its own switch.
  4. A comment can match it — trigger words exist, or it matches any comment.
  5. The opening DM is written — message and button.
  6. The link message is written — there is something to deliver.
  7. Link buttons are valid — every button has a label and a real URL.
  8. The follow ask is written — if the ask is on.
  9. More than one public wording — a warning, not a blocker.
A red item means nothing will be sent. An amber one means something will be sent that we would not have written that way. Each links to the step that fixes it.

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Results

Each funnel in the list shows how many comments it matched and how many people got the link. Expanding Results shows the journey and the most recent 50 runs. A row also says whether the person was following you when the link went out, and links to the DM thread in the Inbox once one exists. Failures are shown, not summarised. This runs unattended against Instagram, and a failure count with the message underneath is the only way to learn that your private replies have started being refused.

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Duplicating and deleting

Duplicate copies the wording as a new, unsaved funnel with no post chosen — the only reason to duplicate is to point the same wording at a different post, and two funnels on one post would give that post a row the server never picks. Delete stops the funnel immediately and takes the record of everyone it has already delivered to with it. You are asked to confirm.