Where are Instagram's story safe zones?

On a 1080 by 1920 story, keep important content out of the top 250 pixels (profile chip and progress bars) and the bottom 250 pixels (reply bar and caption). The central rectangle is the reliable safe area.

Are reels safe zones different from stories?

Yes. Reels place more UI on the right edge (like, comment, share, audio) and a larger bottom band for the caption and username. Reserve roughly 14% top, 20% bottom, and the right 10% for reels.

Why do my story captions get hidden?

If you place text in the bottom 250 to 350 pixels it sits behind the reply bar, swipe-up prompts, or the music sticker. Move text into the central safe zone so it always stays visible across devices.

Does the safe zone change by phone model?

Slightly. Notches and rounded corners vary, so the safe zone is a conservative rectangle that works across devices. Designing inside the recommended margins keeps content visible on the widest range of phones.

What percentages should I reserve?

A safe default is to keep the top 14% and bottom 20% of the 1920-pixel height clear, plus about 6% on each side. For reels, add the right 10% for the action buttons. Everything else is reliably visible.

Instagram Safe Zone Guide

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Instagram layers its own buttons, progress bars, and captions over your story and reel, and anything you place in those zones gets covered. This guide renders the 1080 by 1920 canvas with the UI dead zones marked so you can confirm your logo, text, and call to action all sit in the safe area before you export.

How it works

The simulator uses Instagram’s documented overlay regions, expressed as percentages of the 1080 by 1920 frame:

Story: top ~13% (profile chip and progress bars) and bottom ~13% (reply bar) are unsafe.
Reels: top ~14%, bottom ~20%, and the right ~10% (action buttons) are unsafe.

The remaining central rectangle is highlighted as the safe zone. The tool also prints the exact pixel margins so you can add guides to your design file.

Tips and notes

Treat the safe rectangle as a hard boundary for anything that must be read: brand logos, headlines, prices, and calls to action. Decorative backgrounds can bleed to the edges freely. For reels specifically, push captions and key text away from the bottom-right corner, where the audio chip and action stack live. When in doubt, leave a little extra breathing room — phones with tall notches eat into the top margin more than the conservative default.