How to Open an Instagram JSON File

An Instagram JSON file is plain text, so any text editor opens it: Notepad on Windows, TextEdit on Mac, or just drag it into a browser tab. You do not need to install anything. Opening it is the easy part; reading it is hard, because it is a long run of braces and brackets. Here is how to open it, how to interpret it, and how to skip the reading altogether.

What a JSON file is

JSON is a format for storing data as text, built from braces {}, brackets [] and "key": value pairs. Many services use it when they export data because programs can process it easily. The .json in followers_1.json only tells you how the text is structured; inside, it is ordinary text.

If you do not have the file yet, it arrives inside the ZIP that Instagram sends. The full route is in how to download your Instagram data step by step.

How to open it on each device

First, the ZIP: to open a JSON by hand you have to unzip the ZIP and find the file in connections/followers_and_following/. Then:

1. Windows: right-click the file → Open with → Notepad. If it is not listed, look for it among the available apps.
2. Mac: right-click (or Control-click) the file → Open With → TextEdit.
3. Any computer, with a browser: open a new tab and drag the file onto it. The browser shows it as text without editing it.
4. Phone: you can open it with a file app or a text editor, but thousands of lines on a small screen are hard to read. To look at the content properly, use a computer.

You do not need to save anything. If you are only looking, close it without saving changes so the original stays untouched.

What it looks like inside

Each account is a record with this structure (the username and number in the sample are an example, not real data):

{
  "string_list_data": [
    {
      "href": "https://www.instagram.com/username",
      "value": "username",
      "timestamp": 1712345678
    }
  ]
}

• value is the username.
• href is the link to the profile.
• timestamp is the date the relationship began, in Unix format: seconds since 1 January 1970. In followers_1.json it is when that account started following you; in following.json, when you started following it.

Depending on when the export was generated, the file can be a direct list of records or an object that wraps the list in a key: relationships_followers, relationships_following or relationships_follow_requests_sent. The records themselves look the same. Which file holds what, and why followers can be spread across several files, is explained in what is inside the Instagram ZIP.

How to read the dates by hand

The timestamp number is not readable as it stands, but it converts easily:

• In a spreadsheet: paste the number into a cell, say A1, and in another cell type =A1/86400+DATE(1970,1,1). Format the cell as a date and you will see the day. The result is in UTC.
• In a browser: open the developer console and type new Date(1712345678 * 1000), swapping in your own number. With that example value you get 5 April 2024.

Why reading it by hand is not worth it

A follower JSON is not a table: each account takes several lines, so a long list turns into hundreds or thousands of near-identical lines. To find who does not follow you back you would have to compare following.json against every followers_N.json, and a single omission gives a wrong result with no warning.

NomeSigueApp does that work in your browser: drop in the ZIP as it is, without unzipping, or the loose JSON files (followers_1.json, followers_2.json if present, and following.json). It merges split files, understands both formats and shows six result tabs (who does not follow you back, who you do not follow back, mutuals, pending requests, all followers and all accounts you follow), each with its count, the date for each account and a link to the profile. You can sort, search by name and download the active tab as a CSV to open in Excel or Google Sheets. Nothing is uploaded to any server.

Frequently asked questions

What program opens a .json file?

Any text editor (Notepad, TextEdit) or a browser. No particular program is required, because it is text.

Can I convert Instagram's JSON to Excel?

Not directly: opening it in Excel as it is does not give a clean table, because each account is a record with nested structure. It is more practical to run the ZIP through the tool and download the CSV, which already has username, profile_url and followed_at in columns.

Why does my file open as a wall of text?

That is how an unformatted JSON normally looks. It is not broken. If the text makes no sense (strange symbols, a blank page), check that you did not open the ZIP without unzipping it, and that you chose JSON rather than HTML when requesting the export.

Is it safe to open Instagram's JSON file?

Opening it in a text editor is safe: nothing gets executed. Keep in mind that it contains your contact list, so do not upload it to sites unless you know they process the data in your browser.