How To Add Camera Roll Photos To Instagram Story: Add Story In Instagram From Gallery

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This tutorial is a result of one of those queries that users ask us via our Contact form, Social Media, or personal accounts of our editors. Someone asked me on Quora: How can I add Instagram stories from Gallery or Camera Roll? It made me come up with this tutorial to explain how to add Camera Roll photos to Instagram story.

Besides that, I have also explained how to add multiple Instagram stories at once and how to upload long videos to Instagram stories from iPhone and Android.

Add Posts To Instagram Stories From Gallery Or Camera Roll (Video)

If you want to post photos or videos to your stories, Instagram does allow you to do that. Here’s how.

YouTube player

You can also follow our step-by-step instructions:

  1. Open the Instagram app and go to the Story camera.
    To do this, you have two options:
    1. swipe right on your news feed to create an Instagram story;
    2. tap on Your Story avatar in the Instagram stories tray, if it is your first photo or video.
Open the Story Camera
  1. You will be taken to the Story Camera.
  2. Here you will be able to see the gallery icon with the thumbnail of the most recent media in your phone’s gallery at the bottom left.
    Tap on it to get the photos or videos from the Camera Roll or Gallery.
Story Camera > Camera Roll
  1. On this screen, you will be able to see all the media from your Gallery or Camera Roll.
    You can even switch to different albums by tapping on the Last 24 Hours drop-down menu. Unlike earlier, it is also possible to select photos that are more than 24 hours older. Basically any photo or video in your gallery.
    On Android, users need to tap on the Gallery drop-down menu to select from old photos or videos in the Camera Roll.
Last 24 Hours
  1. Next, tap on the desired photo to select it.
  2. After this, you can do all the editing you want as usual and then send it to your Instagram story or friends via Direct Messages.
Select Desired Photo

Upload Multiple Photos Or Videos To Instagram Stories

Instagram app also has a convenient option to select multiple media from the Camera Roll or Gallery at once for adding to Instagram story.

  1. Open the Instagram app and go to the Story camera.
  2. Tap the Select Multiple icon at the top right corner to select multiple photos and videos.
Select Multiple Feature
Add multiple photos or videos to Instagram story
  1. Tap on the desired media files and select Next when you’re satisfied. You can undo a selection by tapping on it once again.
Select Multiple Photos
  1. Now, you can edit the photos and videos you selected individually.
    You can switch to each of them by tapping on their respective thumbnails at the bottom left. Then you can do all the editing like adding filters, stickers, text, etc. for them.
    You can also remove specific photos or videos. Here’s how you do it:
    1. Long-press or tap the selected thumbnail.
    2. Tap on the Trash icon.
    3. The clip is deleted.
      Delete Specific Story
  2. Finally, tap on Next and share the photos/videos to your Instagram story at once or send them to your friends.

Upload Long Videos To Instagram Stories

When you try to add a long video, the Instagram app automatically splits it into smaller clips of 15 seconds. This is great but there is a limit of 60 seconds of the video that you can upload.

You can bypass this limitation by splitting the video into the 15-sec clips yourself and then adding them to Instagram stories from Gallery or Camera roll. In the stories, they will look like a complete video.

Here’s how you can do it on Android and iOS devices.

iPhone

You will need an app called Crop Video – Cut Videos Editor To Trim & Split Vid. Unfortunately, the app is not free so you will have to pay if you want to use it.

  1. Use the following link to install the app.
    Launch the app once it is installed.
  2. Allow the app to access your photo library. All the videos will be loaded into the app.
  3. Tap on the video that you wish to split and tap on Select at the top right corner.
Upload Long videos on Instagram Stories from iOS
  1. Now, select Trim & Cut from the listed options.
  2. On the next screen, select Cut tab at the top.
  3. After that, move the marker at the bottom to the start of the video 00:00 and tap on Start Here.
  4. Slide the marker to 00:15 and select End Here.
  5. After setting the start and end, tap on Done at the top right.
  6. To save the trimmed video, tap on Share icon at the top right and select Gallery.
    Or you can directly share it as an Instagram story.
Post Lengthy Videos In Instagram Story
  1. Now, go back and select the original full-length video.
  2. Similarly, move the start and end markers to 00:15 and 00:30 respectively.
  3. Trim and save it again.
  4. Repeat the steps until your whole video is split into 15-second clips.
  5. Now, upload the clips to your Instagram story as usual.

Android

If you have Android, you can use the VidTrim app. It is available for free on the Play Store.

  1. After installing, launch the app and select the video you wish to split.
  2. Adjust the start and end markers by sliding your finger. Make sure that the overall length doesn’t exceed 15 seconds.
  3. Now, tap on the Scissor icon and select Save As New Clip.
  4. Do these steps until you split the rest of the video into 15-second clips.
  5. Then, post them one after another in the Instagram app as usual.
Post Lengthy Videos To Instagram Stories on Android

Bonus: Resize The Photo Properly While Adding From Gallery/Camera Roll

Now, you might face an issue with photos being zoomed in and not completely visible while adding them from Gallery to Instagram story.

This happens with portrait photos and videos because Instagram maximizes your media to fill the screen with the 16:9 portrait aspect ratio.

To fix that, you can use two methods:

  1. Pinch inward and resize the photo or video according to your requirement.
  2. Alternatively, if the image quality is not an issue, take a screenshot of the photo and add it to your Instagram story.

It will make the image fit perfectly with blank spaces on the top and below. You can use this space can be used to add text, emoticons, or draw something.

Conclusion

We hope that now, you know how to add Camera Roll photos to an Instagram story and how to add story in Instagram from Gallery.

BTW, you can do it with WhatsApp stories as well if you use WhatsApp.

Share this tutorial with your Instagram friends if you found it useful. And while you’re there follow TechUntold on Instagram.

About The Author

  • Hemant Mendiratta

    Hemant Mendiratta is a co-founder of TechUntold and a passionate tech blogger, avid gamer, and social media guru who keenly monitors useful apps and gadgets. He is the ideator of our Instagram tool StoryHoot which allows watching Instagram stories anonymously. You can connect with him on: Facebook, Twitter.

Photo of author

Hemant Mendiratta

Hemant Mendiratta is a co-founder of TechUntold and a passionate tech blogger, avid gamer, and social media guru who keenly monitors useful apps and gadgets. He is the ideator of our Instagram tool StoryHoot which allows watching Instagram stories anonymously. You can connect with him on: Facebook, Twitter.

14 thoughts on “How To Add Camera Roll Photos To Instagram Story: Add Story In Instagram From Gallery”

  1. Hi I have tried adding multiple pictures to the story but it doesn’t work. After the first I try again same procedure and it just shows me how many people have viewed it and the options for downloading it or saving it but if I swipe up there’s no way to add more, just doesn’t show the pictures again to choose from just the one I had already added I don’t really see how I could be doing this wrong tbh. Help please ????

    Reply
    • Hi Tasha,
      It seems you are swiping on the incorrect screen. To add second photo/video to your story, tap on the Camera icon(at the top left) or swipe right on the news feed screen and then swipe upwards to get the media from Gallery/Camera roll.
      Currently, you are swiping on your already uploaded photo/video screen which won’t give you options to add more media to your story.
      I hope this helps you 🙂

      Reply
    • Hi Kunal, Unfortunately video limit in Instagram stories is 15 seconds. If you wish to post a video longer than that then you will have to split the video into videos of 15 seconds each and then post multiple stories.

      I hope this helps.

      Reply
    • hi Blaire,
      Take the screenshot of that particular picture and then try to add it to the story.
      It will fit perfectly 🙂

      Reply

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