Free Instagram comment to DM automation

Free Instagram comment to DM automation sends a direct message the moment someone comments a keyword on your post or reel. On inDM it costs $0, asks for no card, and has no message count behind it: every comment that matches gets a DM, whether that is four in a quiet week or four thousand the day a reel takes off. One connected Instagram account, and every DM ends with a one-line inDM credit.

Most free tiers in this category can do comment-to-DM and then stop partway through a good day, because they count the messages. This one does not count them, which matters most on exactly the day it matters most.

How comment to DM automation works

Four steps, and Instagram does the first one.

1. Someone comments on your post or reel.
2. Meta sends a webhook the instant it lands.
3. Your keyword is matched against the comment text, case-insensitively.
4. The DM goes out through Instagram's messaging API, usually within seconds.

The mechanism is Instagram's private reply, which Meta built so a business could answer a comment with a DM. Meta allows one private reply per comment, within 7 days of it being posted, and does not restrict what that reply carries. So your link can arrive in a single message rather than behind a button tap. The full mechanism is in how Instagram DM automation works.

You can also reply publicly under the comment at the same time, which is what makes a thread look answered to everyone scrolling past rather than only to the person who commented.

What is included on the free plan

Comment-to-DM is not a reduced version on the free plan. It is the same automation the paid plan runs.

• Unlimited comments matched, unlimited DMs sent. No monthly allowance, no overage, nothing to forecast.
• Unlimited keywords per automation, case-insensitive, plus a match-anything mode for a post where every comment should get the same reply.
• The follow gate, if you want the link to arrive after a follow.
• The email capture gate, if you want an address instead.
• A public comment reply alongside the DM.
• Per-automation analytics: how many times it fired, how many people it reached, and where the journey ends.
• Contacts and export, so the people it reaches are yours to keep.

One connected Instagram account, and a small number of automations running at once, which is enough for the posts most creators are actively promoting. The free plan asks one thing in return: every DM it sends ends with a line reading "Automation powered by @indm.social", set beneath your own copy. Your words, your buttons and your links are untouched.

Growth is $4.99 the first month, then $14.99/month. It puts your name on the messages alone, connects as many Instagram accounts as you like, lifts the automation limit, carries several links in one automation, sends a follow-up message hours after the first, lets an automation wait for a post you have not published yet, and shows you who opened your links and the countries they came from.

Set one up on a real post

About three minutes, and you pick the post before you do anything else.

1. Connect Instagram with one tap through Instagram's own login. A Business or Creator account is required, and switching is free.
2. Pick the post or reel from your own content.
3. Add the keyword people will comment. Pick something they would type anyway: "link", "price", "guide".
4. Write the DM and watch it render in a live preview before it can send.
5. Set it live, then comment the keyword from a second account. Your own comment on your own post will not trigger it, because Instagram treats it differently, and this is the single most common reason a first test looks broken.

The step-by-step version is in comment-to-DM setup.

Choosing a keyword that works

The keyword is the only part of this a stranger has to get right, so make it easy.

• One word, not a phrase. "LINK" beats "send me the link please".
• Say it in the caption and in the video. Most people who comment it heard it rather than read it.
• Avoid a word that appears in normal comments, or the automation answers people who were not asking. If a post is about pricing, "price" will fire on conversation rather than on intent.
• Watch for collisions. Two automations on one account sharing a keyword is ambiguous, and inDM warns you at the point you save rather than after.

Where free comment to DM stops

Two ceilings, and neither of them belongs to a plan.

Instagram's own rate limit. 750 private replies per hour per account is Meta's number, and it applies to every tool on every tier. A post would have to be doing extraordinarily well to reach it, and if it does, the automation holds rather than losing the queue.

The messaging window. A comment lets you send one private reply. It does not open a 24-hour window for free-form messaging, so a second message needs the person to come back to you first, by tapping a button or replying. This is why a gate or an opening DM changes what an automation can do later.

Both apply identically to paid plans, here and everywhere else. A free plan is the same API with less counting in front of it.

Start free, see free auto DM for Instagram for the keyword-DM shape, or read what the free plan runs in full.