If Instagram Stories were an outfit, then Instagram stickers would be the accessories. Stickers add functionality to Stories, help further communicate your message, and let you be more creative.
Read on to learn how to use stickers in your Instagram Stories.
What are Instagram stickers?
Instagram stickers are dynamic graphic elements you can add to both image and video Stories. Some are animated, some are clickable, and others even allow users to interact directly with your Instagram Story. They make your Stories more interesting and are designed to boost engagement.
Instagram offers an array of stickers, ranging from timed countdowns to GIFs, mentions of other accounts, locations, poll stickers or emoji sliders, and more. The platform even introduces timely, limited-edition stickers to celebrate seasons, holidays, or important moments like Pride Month and elections.
This range of options allows you to select the stickers aligned with your brand and how you want to engage with your audiences. For example, if you have an Instagram Shop, you can add a product sticker over a video of the product.
“Some businesses prefer a less direct tactic and Instagram Stories are perfect for adding product stickers as a low-pressure sales tactic.” —Taylor Loren, brand and marketing consultant
Types of Instagram stickers
While some stickers help to make your Stories more fun, others directly contribute to your Instagram marketing objectives (for example, a poll can increase engagement). There’s no shortage of options to choose from and you can mix and match stickers in the same Story. Here are the different types of stickers you can use for your Instagram marketing:
1. Hashtag stickers add a clickable hashtag to your Instagram Story to reach more users. When users click on a hashtag sticker, they’ll be taken to the hashtag’s feed, just like if they’d searched for it manually. You can only add one per Story.
2. Poll stickers ask users a question and give them up to four answers from which to choose. By default, you can ask a yes or no question, but you can change the answer choices. Users click on the sticker to answer and receive the results in real time. As the poster, you can see who voted and what they voted for as well, giving you the opportunity to engage directly with viewers.
3. Question stickers let you crowdsource ideas, feedback, and responses from your audience with an open-ended question. You can then share answers on subsequent Stories as a follow-up, user-generated content (UGC) post.
4. Location stickers tag a location in your Instagram Story to expand your reach. When users tap on a location sticker, they’ll see a feed of other content with the same location tag. You can only add one per Story.
5. Mention stickers tag another user in your Stories, notifying them that you’ve done so. When someone taps on the sticker, they’ll be taken to the tagged user’s profile. You can tag more than one account.
6.Music stickers add background music to your images or videos, letting you choose a soundtrack from Spotify.
7. Countdown stickers add a countdown timer toward a specific time and/or date (useful for product launches or events).
8. GIF stickers are looping graphics from GIPHY that you can add to Stories. A GIF sticker isn’t just fun and dynamic, but also can be used to add animated calls to action to your Stories (e.g., “Follow us”).
9. Product stickers are available through the integration. with this sales channel enabled will be able to tag products in their Stories. Users can tap to see the price, name, and product description, and tap again to go directly to the product page to purchase.
10. Emoji slider stickers ask users a question that they can answer with a slider such as “On a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you love our new line compared to last year?” You can choose an emoji to represent their response, and users will see the average after they cast their votes.
11. Date stickers will show the date that the photo, video, or Story was created. Use these to post throwback content to reminisce about the past.
12. Link stickers replaced the swipe-up feature, allowing you to link to content outside the Instagram app in your Story.
How to add stickers to an Instagram story
Instagram’s streamlined user interface makes it easy to add a sticker to any story in a matter of seconds. Follow these steps:
1. Take or upload a photo or video to a Story.
2. Tap the sticker icon in the top right corner of the editing options.
3. Browse through customizable and interactive stickers.
4. Scroll down to find additional sticker options.
5. Click on the sticker you want to add.
6. Position and resize the sticker on your Story.
How to create custom cutout Instagram stickers
Don’t see a sticker option that suits your intent? You can create your own by transforming part of any image or video into a custom cutout Instagram sticker. Here’s how:
1. Take or upload a photo or video to a Story.
2. Tap the sticker icon at the top of your Story.
3. Select the “cutouts” sticker option; this opens your camera roll.
4. Choose the image or video that you want to turn into a sticker.
- Instagram automatically turns a central object within the image/video into a sticker. (If you want to use a different part of the image as a sticker, switch to “Select manually” on the bottom left of the screen and tap the area you want to use as a sticker).
- When you’ve successfully selected the part of the image you want to turn into a sticker, tap “Use sticker” then the cutout will appear on your story, and you can adjust its size and placement.
Instagram will automatically save your custom sticker in the stickers menu so you can quickly add it to future stories. You will find your custom sticker beneath the interactive stickers menu.
You can also create cutout stickers from other accounts’ posts if the account is public and they’ve enabled cutout sticker permissions in their privacy settings. To do so, tap the three dots at the top right of the video or photo. You’ll see an option to create a cutout sticker, which will be saved to your sticker menu after you design it.
Creative ways to use Instagram Story stickers for marketing
- Create branded stickers
- Ask for feedback and test ideas
- Host an AMA to connect with your followers on a personal level
- Emphasize how popular your products are and generate excitement
- Create more relatable Stories by adding a soundtrack
- Promote your branded hashtags
- Tag locations of events you’re attending
- Ask customers to choose between products
- Use countdown stickers to hype up events
- Drive sales to your newest products
- Use the “Sound on” to get users to enable sound
- Collaborate with other businesses
- Get festive with seasonal Instagram stickers
- Use the link sticker to drive traffic
- Raise money for a nonprofit with the donate sticker
- Encourage users to create UGC with the “Add yours” sticker
From straightforward options like sharing a link to your website to more in-depth strategies such as gauging customer sentiment about a potential new product launch, Instagram Story stickers present an array of marketing opportunities:
Create branded stickers
Because you can easily make your own Instagram Story stickers with the cutout feature, this also means you can create branded stickers that highlight aspects of your business. This is a playful way to reinforce your brand identity, and because custom cutout stickers save to your profile, you can use them repeatedly.
Design your preferred sticker on an external platform like the graphic design service Canva, save that image to your camera roll, then use the same process you would to make any other cutout sticker.
Searching for ideas? Your logo, a photo or illustration of your product, or a typographic representation of your brand name are all great places to start when brainstorming branded stickers.
Mushroom coffee brand Ryze created a variety of branded stickers, such as an illustrated sticker bearing its logo and illustrated mushroom stickers featuring its mascot.
Ask for feedback and test ideas
The temporary nature of Stories make them great for soliciting feedback—after 24 hours, when you have the input you need, your Instagram Story automatically disappears.
Poll stickers, emoji slider stickers, question stickers, and quiz stickers each present opportunities for getting different types of feedback, depending on the type of survey question you want to ask.
You might use an emoji slider to ask your followers to rate something on a scale of 1 to 10. Or, you could use the poll sticker, inviting them to pick a side in a popular debate.
Not only can you learn more about your audience this way: You can also use Stories as a testing ground for new product and marketing ideas.
For example, energy drink brand Joggy asked followers where they’d like a future event to take place. Perfume company Dossier used the question sticker to ask viewers what scent they’d like to see next from the brand.
Host an AMA to connect with your followers on a personal level
Ask me anything (AMA) sessions give your followers direct access to you, the person behind the brand, in a way that most social media content doesn’t.
Using the question sticker, you can facilitate an AMA session and pull back the curtain to offer followers a chance to get to know you. Let people know that you’ll answer the best questions in your Stories, and get ready to watch them pour into your notifications.
Your followers may jump at the chance to ask questions your About Us page doesn’t cover, like what products are coming up or what your favorite book is. An AMA is also a great place to lean into a founder or employee’s expertise. For example, dermatologist and skin care brand founder Dr. Sherene Idress was able to answer a question about sun protection during an AMA hosted on the Dr. Idriss brand account. Other questions, like one about the brand’s Black Friday sale, didn’t require Dr. Idress’s dermatological expertise and could be handled by other team members.
Emphasize how popular your products are and generate excitement
The emoji slider sticker doesn’t just have to ask for concrete feedback or pose serious questions. You can also use this fun, interactive sticker to label your products with more lighthearted prompts that motivate followers to show some love for your brand.
Customers will spend a little more time on your story by engaging with the sticker, and it might remind them how much they enjoy your brand as they slide a heart eyes or fire emoji to the right. They’ll also see the results of the sticker, indicating that other followers informally gave a positive review to your product, too.
This simple tool for emphasizing how beloved your brand is may be especially useful when you’re trying to ramp up excitement for an event or new product launch, like clothing company Lisa Says Gah did when it showed a zoomed-in photo of a knit.
Create more relatable Stories by adding a soundtrack
Music stickers can help establish a certain mood or feeling and effectively grab a user’s attention. From lip syncing along on video to playing holiday music over your photos, a music sticker offers opportunities to get creative with your content.
If you aren’t sure where to start, Instagram has music sorted by moods and genres, and users can search for specific tracks, enabling you to add snippets of hits from big names like Cardi B, Fleetwood Mac, and other artists on Spotify.
Music stickers can also help you express yourself as a brand and connect with your audience through shared tastes.
Promote your branded hashtags
Many brands will try to harness the power of hashtags to get users talking about them in a way that is easy to monitor. They’ll use branded hashtags, or contest- or event-specific hashtags to generate awareness and encourage users to also post content using the same tags.
Because hashtags often get buried in your Instagram posts, Stories are a great way to bring them to the forefront of your audience’s attention. A hashtag sticker can make it visually pop.
If you have a branded hashtag populated by content from your fans, use the hashtag sticker to direct your audience to this gallery of content. When Instagram Story viewers click on the sticker, they’ll immediately see all the other posts containing the tag, which can serve as powerful social proof.
Tag locations of events you’re attending
Attending a trade show, conference, farmers market, or other event? Whether you’re actively selling your products or just networking, post a Story to show your followers that you’re there in person, and make sure to add a location sticker.
This will not only let your followers know you’re there, but also help others at the event discover you if they’re also browsing the location tag.
In the Story below, olive oil company Graza encourages viewers to visit the brand’s in-person activation by tagging its location: Washington Square Park in New York City.
Ask customers to choose between products
Using poll or question stickers and asking customers to choose between different products is an excellent way to promote two items at once, share visible social proof, and learn about your audience’s preferences.
The ease of participating will work in your favor, and everyone else will see the results live.
Some users will want to vote simply so they can see how others are voting, and once they see the results, they may be inspired to purchase.
Shoe and clothing brand Miista showed a corner of an apartment with several shoes. It used the question sticker to ask viewers if it recognized two of its boots among a collection of shoes. Skin care brand Dr. Idriss used the same poll sticker to ask viewers which of its four tinted lip balms they were most excited about.
Use countdown stickers to hype up events
You can use stickers to build excitement for events like a pop-up shop or the launch of a new collection. Attach the date sticker to a sneak-peak photo or behind-the-scenes video, and let users know how much time they have left before the big event.
Makeup brand Merit shared a swatch of a shade against a white background and included a countdown timer to the winter 2025 set. It’s a sticker you can continue to reuse as the time ticks down, which can serve as a constant reminder to your audience.
Drive sales to your newest products
Instagram’s product stickers don’t just raise awareness for your products: They also help you convert that attention into sales. Users can tap on a product sticker to learn more about the featured product, and then tap again to navigate to a product page for purchase.
When introducing its holiday collection for 2025 on Instagram Stories, Christy Dawn shared an image of each new item to its Stories with a product sticker attached, making it easy for followers to tap through and shop the entire collection.
You can even feature multiple products in a single Story to give your audience options and show off a collection of products, as Tyler McGillivary does here:
Use the “Sound on” to get users to enable sound
Instagram stickers are a great tool for turning implied actions into explicit calls to action. For instance, because videos play without sound by default, the “Sound on” sticker can make it clear that sound is an integral part of the content users are viewing.
A “Sound on” sticker encourages users to enable sound, even if they likely wouldn’t have otherwise thought to.
It’s a simple addition to your video Stories that can help you keep your audience’s attention longer.
Collaborate with other businesses
Sometimes building relationships with other brands is a smart way to market your business, and sharing some love on Instagram can benefit both of you—especially if they return the favor.
Shoutout exchanges are an easy-to-implement and effective co-marketing tactic, provided you can find a complementary brand with a target audience that overlaps with your own.
Use the mention sticker to tag other businesses when sharing Stories about them and what they do. They could be a vendor, an industry influencer, or just a complementary business that you’re working with on an event or a collaboration.
The mention sticker is also useful for current and aspiring Instagram influencers. Use it to connect with a brand you like to get on their radar for future partnerships or to deepen an existing relationship. Here’s an example from a beauty creator who used the mention sticker to shout-out The Lip Bar. The brand then reposted her story, helping it reach a wider audience and providing social proof to shoppers.
Get festive with seasonal Instagram stickers
Whether it’s April Fool’s Day, Halloween, or Thanksgiving, people love getting festive—especially when it comes to Stories. Seasonal stickers will pop up at the appropriate time for almost every major holiday you can think of, making it easier for you to add a festive holiday touch to your Stories without any extra effort.
Nothing suggests a possible Christmas gift idea quite like an animated Santa Claus walking across your stocking stuffers.
Use the link sticker to drive traffic
A link sticker can make a link stand out. By default, the link sticker will use the website address, but you can customize the link text in a more creative way.
Fashion brand Sandy Liang used a link sticker to send users to its newsletter signup. Instead of leaving the default link label, the brand opted for something with a little more personality: the word “subscribe” and an envelope emoji.
Raise money for a nonprofit with the donate sticker
As a business with some level of influence with your followers, you can encourage them to donate to a good cause related to your industry, or one that reflects your brand values.
Similar to the link sticker, the donate sticker automatically adds text asking users to donate to the selected charity. You can change the text to whatever you want, within character limits. (Side note: Instagram will only show charities that have Instagram accounts linked up with donation information.)
Here’s an example from Charlotte Parlermino, cofounder of skin care brand Dieux, asking for donations to anti-hunger nonprofit City Harvest:
Encourage users to create UGC with the “Add yours” sticker
With the “Add yours” option, you can create an Instagram story template or source of inspiration for your followers to use.
To use this feature, start by designing an Instagram Story that you want others to copy. This could be a collage of photos, a selfie, or an image of you using a product. You’ll then select the “Add yours” option from the sticker menu and type in a prompt that will motivate followers to recreate a similar story themselves.
Once you’ve posted a Story with the “Add yours” sticker, any of your followers can tap on the sticker you shared and use it to create their own Story based on your inspiration. Even more importantly, by tapping on the “Add yours” sticker you designed, anyone can see all of the other Instagram Stories that used your sticker. This presents a great opportunity to encourage customers to organically share photos of your products.
Idaho-based clothing and accessory store Twisted Mountain Boutique used the “Add yours” sticker both as a way to prompt followers to share UGC with any fall products they’d purchased and to showcase some of its current in-store items.
Tracking your performance with Instagram stickers
Instagram stickers are a great way to get more engagement, traffic, and social proof out of your Stories, in addition to brand awareness. In order to understand the effect that different stickers have on your content, however, it’s important to monitor their performance.
One of the main ways to measure engagement is through sticker taps, which measure user interactions with your stickers. These taps can tell you what sort of stickers resonate most with your followers.
Interactive stickers can give you even more insights. For example, if you add polls or question stickers, you can see how many people responded. Studying these analytics can help you understand what sort of quizzes and polls followers prefer. Do they respond more to AMA-style questions or to funny polls? This can help you decide which stickers to use in future Stories.
Cute Instagram stickers
While functional stickers like hashtag and link stickers are super useful, you can also add them for the sake of aesthetics. Using fun, cute, or aesthetic stickers can help reinforce your branding or signify a more casual Instagram Story interaction.
Whatever the case, here are cute sticker sets you can find based on keywords and specific artists. Just type the following terms into the search function of the sticker section:
- Cute. Designed by various artists, these stickers are adorable. Think dancing animal-based characters blowing kisses.
- Plants. From flowers to GIFs of trees growing, the plant stickers are good to convey growth, change, and a nurturing nature.
- Pastel. In hues of pink, blue, and yellow, these stickers often have sweet messages.
- Boho. These stickers inspire a calm and relaxed feel, typically using fall colors.
- Mikyla. This highlights graphic designer Mikyla Miller, who uses a pastel color palette and themed illustrations for moments like Halloween and Easter.
- Izzyink. Izzyink’s stickers mostly feature text like “thankful for you” and “road tripping” that work in various contexts.
- Green Dotori. Green Dotori uses simple graphic-based illustrations that brands can use for calls to action (CTA).
- Wildflowerbar. Wildflowerbar’s illustrations feature cute cacti, hearts, and word-based GIFs for Hungarian speakers!
- Latifundija. These stickers are simple personifications of everyday foods or objects (plus a few Pokémon).
- Studio Jonesy. Studio Jonesy is a UK-based artist with a focus on positive moments. A few stickers are specifically useful for small businesses, such as “Giveaway,” “I can’t wait!!!” and “Click me”
- Ketnipz. Ketnipz is a cute bean character with variations for different situations, like showing excitement or going on a shopping spree.
Instagram stickers: A fun and functional feature
Instagram stickers are more than just a fun add-on that layers smiley faces onto your Stories. They can play an integral role in Instagram marketing, allowing you to generate social proof, engagement, reach, brand awareness, and traffic to your profile and even your site.
They’re a valued part of your Instagram marketing tool kit and, with a bit of strategy, they can help you get more out of every story you publish.
Feature image by Pavel Danilyuk/Pexels
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Instagram stickers FAQ
How can Instagram stickers be leveraged for business?
Instagram stickers can enhance audience engagement by making posts and Stories interactive. Features like polls, quizzes, and countdowns encourage user participation and can provide valuable insights. For example, businesses can use question stickers to gather feedback or generate ideas for future products, fostering a sense of community among followers.
How do I get Instagram stickers?
Add Instagram stickers to a Story by clicking the square smiley face icon on the top of your screen. You can scroll through available stickers, or search for a sticker based on keywords.
Why are Instagram stickers so popular?
Instagram stickers are a fun, dynamic way to add interest to Instagram Stories. Stickers can be animated or clickable, and allow users to interact with your Story. Basically, stickers make your Stories more interesting and increase engagement.
Can you make your own sticker on Instagram?
You can create your own Instagram sticker using images from your phone’s gallery or camera roll. To make your own sticker, open the stickers tab in Stories and select “Cutouts” to create a sticker from an image.
