Instagram Reel Drafts are the latest feature to hit Instagram, allowing you to save unfinished reels as drafts until you’re ready to post. Unfortunately, sometimes accidental taps or failed uploads can make your reel draft mysteriously disappear!
If this has happened to you, don’t worry. This guide will give you all the information you need to recover your disappeared reel drafts on Instagram.
We will cover how to locate disappeared reel drafts within your archived files and provide tips on preventing similar issues in the future. By the end of this guide, you should be able to recover any lost Reel Drafts quickly and easily.
Reasons Why Reel Drafts Disappear
When creating a Reel on Instagram, it’s important to save your work in a draft to finish crafting your post.
But sometimes, those Reel drafts can disappear before you’re ready to post them. This usually happens when there are errors or glitches in Instagram’s system. Let’s look at the possible reasons why this happens.
Accidental Deletion
Accidental deletion is one of the most common causes of why reel drafts disappear on Instagram.
You might have forgotten to save a reel draft or accidentally clicked the delete button while scrolling through, which could cause your reel draft to be lost forever. Fortunately, Instagram has a few features in place for recovering accidental deletions.
The first option is an auto-save feature that automatically saves your reel drafts after you have completed them. This feature will save your work even if you forget to click the save button manually.
Additionally, there is an unsaved bypass in case you neglected to press the auto-save button. Your unsaved drafts will be stored in a recovered folder and accessed easily under Drafts in the Reels section of Instagram’s media library.
To access these recovered drafts, tap on Reels and then tap on Drafts — here, you will find a list of all previously made drafts, lost or not.
All recent posts can be found at the top of your recovered folder. At the same time, older creations are listed chronologically toward the bottom — all unsaved reels will have (Recovered) written underneath their thumbnail image.
If you realize before pressing post that you have misplaced any information from your reel draft, use this recovery folder, as it contains all stories created since its activation, regardless of their current state (if edited, deleted, or forgotten).
Network Issues
There are a variety of potential causes of reel drafts disappearing, but the primary one is usually related to network issues.
If Instagram servers are down or experiencing issues, or the content of your reel causes violations of its terms of service, then the post can automatically be removed. This may cause drafts to be lost when you attempt to upload them.
It’s possible that having a poor internet connection can also play a role in the disappearance of drafts. Other than network-related issues, there may also be an issue with your device itself that can cause your draft to be lost and erased from Instagram’s database.
Additionally, if you are using an older version of Instagram, it is possible for drafts not to upload correctly for various reasons, such as decreased compatibility or bug-related issues.
If none of these problems seem to apply and your reel still isn’t working properly, it might be an issue with the content itself. If any part of your reel goes against their guidelines, there is a chance that it will automatically be taken down without warning and without leaving a trace in the Drafts folder, which makes recovering it difficult or impossible.
It’s always best practice when creating reels to make sure they adhere closely to Instagram’s Community Guidelines, as this can prevent any potential problems before they arise.
Bugs and Glitches
Bugs and glitches are the most common problems that can cause reel drafts to disappear on Instagram.
Whether it be an issue due to a lack of compatibility with the current version of Instagram, a problem relating to server updates, or any other technical issues, these bugs and glitches can often result in unexpected behavior, such as disappearing drafts.
It is important to keep your mobile device as updated as possible for your experience with Instagram to be optimal.
Fortunately, there are steps you can take if your reel drafts do suddenly disappear due to any bugs or glitches on the app or platform.
You may need to clear your cache memory, restart the app several times, update your current version, or log out from all devices with access to your account.
Additionally, sometimes, manually logging out from all devices again and then restarting your device can help resolve the issue if you cannot get back into a draft while logged in on another device.
If none of these attempts work at recovering missing reel drafts due to bugs/glitches, it may be considered irrecoverable until Instagram engineers find a solution.
How to Recover Reel Drafts
Have you ever created a Reel draft on Instagram and then had it disappear? If so, you may be wondering how to recover reel drafts. Fortunately, this can be done quickly if you know the right steps.
In this definitive guide, we’ll discuss the steps you need to take to recover your disappeared drafts from Instagram. So, let’s get started!
Check Your Drafts Folder
If you have been using the Reel feature for some time and post regularly, some of your drafts have likely become a part of your draft folder.
To check if any of your drafts are saved here, go to the ‘Reel tab on Instagram, click on the ‘Creator Studio option in the tray at the bottom right of your screen, and open the Compose window.
Once in the Compose window, look for the ‘Your Drafts’ segment on the top, which lists all your active drafts that might have gone missing from your phone. You can then retrieve these disappeared drafts by clicking on them to complete them for publishing.
It is important to note that only five draft versions are displayed in a single view, and it could be possible that some of our more recent drafts may remain unnoticed.
In such cases, use a two-finger pinch-out gesture to reveal more draft items underneath. You can use this technique multiple times until you find what you want!
Once located, swipe left on any specific item’s tile, which brings up an option titled ‘Restore’ – simply hit this button to restore your disappeared reel drafts into Instagram!
Check Your Recently Deleted Folder
When you delete a Reel from your Instagram, the draft is stored in your Recently Deleted folder for 30 days.
After that period, it will be permanently deleted, and you normally won’t be able to recover it unless you have backed up some of its content on an external service.
To recover a recently deleted Reel, go to your Account Settings by tapping the gear icon. Tap Account from the side menu and scroll down until you find the Recently Deleted section below.
Tap this section and select Manage Your Reel Drafts in the new window. This is where all the drafts of the Reels that have been recently deleted will be listed upon their creation, along with their title, status (draft or published), length, content type (image or video), and more details about them.
You can also sort through these drafts based on categories such as Video length, type of content (Photo/Video/Multi-slide post), Sort Order (Date Created), or add keyword filtering using your search terms.
Once you have identified the specific draft(s) that were recently deleted, press Recover and follow the confirmation dialogs to complete recovery of them into current drafts available for review or further edits before downloading/publishing them on Instagram.
Contact Instagram Support
If you’ve tried the methods described above but still cannot recover your disappeared reel drafts on Instagram, one last option is to contact Instagram Support directly. Even if this method will take more time before recovering your reel drafts, this is a useful way to try getting help.
To contact Instagram support, open the Instagram app and choose the “Settings” icon on the bottom-right part of the screen.
Then, choose “Help” from the Settings page and tap “Report a Problem” at the bottom of this page. Afterward, provide information about your missing reel draft and submit it for consideration by Instagram Support.
Keep in mind that this process may take some time for resolution and should only be done after you’ve attempted all other possible steps that have already been outlined here.
Nevertheless, submitting a request through Instagram Support can be helpful by providing additional support channels other than yourself as you work towards recovering your drafts.
Conclusion
In conclusion, when you find that your Reel draft has disappeared from your Instagram account, it is important to remember the steps you can take to recover it. A good way to ensure that drafts do not disappear from your account is to download copies onto your device regularly.
Also, if your account has been infected with malware or cyber threats or for some other reason, there are ways to protect yourself and recover your data.
Finally, knowing how Instagram works and the guidelines for Reel Drafts can also help you recover them in situations of accidental deletion.
We hope this guide on recovering disappeared Reel drafts on Instagram was helpful! Check out our blog if you want more tips and tricks on using Instagram Reels. Have any further questions? Feel free to get in touch with us by leaving a comment below.
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