Controlling Your Data: Strategies to Limit Instagram’s Use for AI and Advertising

Instagram’s advertising can often seem eerily precise. For instance, if you check out an item on another website, you might see an advertisement for that very product in your feed shortly after. Despite this perception, Meta maintains that it does not utilize your device’s microphone to overhear conversations for ad placement. Instead, businesses may provide information regarding your visits or purchases.

Currently, there’s no single setting to completely halt Instagram’s data collection. Meta can still gather insights based on your searches, views, likes, follows, posts, and clicks within the app. It also collects data related to your device, network, and location, along with information from businesses and across linked accounts. Furthermore, Meta AI is capable of leveraging your Facebook and Instagram activities to enhance its recommendations. To effectively manage what Instagram tracks, you should alter settings for each source individually.

In July 2026, Meta began implementing a more comprehensive control called Activity from other businesses. This new feature updates the previous Your activity off Meta technologies and broadens the functionality of an earlier setting known as Activity information from ad partners. This control allows users to determine whether businesses can utilize the information they provide to customize ads, feed content, and AI responses.

To modify this setting, launch Instagram, navigate to your profile, click on the three-line menu, and access the Accounts Center. Look for Activity from other businesses. Since Meta is rolling this feature out incrementally by region, some users might still encounter Ad preferences > Ad settings > Activity information from ad partners. Select the option that prevents Meta from leveraging your external activity for personalization.

This action won’t completely stop businesses from providing data or Meta from using activity generated within Instagram. Ads may still be influenced by the accounts you follow, the content you engage with, search history, ad interactions, profile details, or customer lists shared by advertisers. The primary goal of this setting is to ensure that your activity outside Meta’s platforms does not impact your advertising experience, not to eliminate all ad personalization.

For users in the European Region, the Accounts Center also provides options for personalized or less personalized ads under Ad preferences > Ad settings > Ad experience. The less personalized option uses fewer signals but can still utilize factors such as age, location, device details, ad interactions, and currently visible content.

On iPhone, navigate to Settings > Privacy & Security > Tracking and disable Instagram’s tracking permissions. Apple’s Ask App Not to Track feature blocks tracking across apps and websites from other companies intended for advertising or sharing information with data brokers. This does not prevent Instagram from tracking your activities within its own application.

For Android devices, locate the settings at Settings > Apps > Instagram > Permissions. Review access for location, contacts, photos, camera, and microphone, and disable any unnecessary permissions. Turning off location access reduces one form of data collection, though Meta can still estimate your location via your IP address and network details.

To manage contact information, visit Accounts Center > Your information and permissions > Upload contacts, select the Instagram account, and disable Connect contacts on all devices. This stops future syncing but does not erase contacts that have already been uploaded. To delete them, use Manage contacts in Accounts Center on the Instagram website, but note that deletion can take up to 90 days.

Meta uses data collected from accounts organized within the same Accounts Center to tailor ads and recommend accounts to follow. Removing an account from Accounts Center > Accounts will delete it from that center but may also disable shared logins and other features while retaining the account information.

Since December 16, 2025, Meta has been using interactions with its AI features as indicators for customizing content and ads in numerous regions. For example, a conversation about outdoor activities could lead to recommendations for hiking-related posts or products. Nonetheless, there is no distinct setting to allow users to interact with Meta AI while excluding those conversations from being used for personalization.

There are, however, two commands available in Instagram AI chats. You can type /reset-ai to erase that AI’s record of the conversation and the associated details, or /reset-all-ais to clear all AI chat histories within the application. Note that your visible chat will remain until you delete it manually. These commands do not opt you out of advertising, regular data collection, or model training practices.

Model training operates separately from personalization. Meta leverages public posts and interactions with AI features to enhance its generative AI models, particularly in regions where it relies on legitimate interests. Users located in the EU and UK can lodge objections through Meta’s Privacy Center, though this right is not universally available as an Instagram setting.

Avoid sharing personal details, financial information, or any sensitive data in Meta AI chats. Employ the reset commands post-discussion if you wish to prevent the AI from retaining any details, and utilize the object form when available.