Instagram has launched a tool that lets users change the music on feed posts and carousels they have already published.
The feature, called Replace Audio, keeps a post’s likes, comments, shares and reach in place when the soundtrack is changed.
Until now, changing the music on a published Instagram post meant deleting it and uploading it again from scratch.
Instagram announced the tool on Tuesday (July 21), with the platform’s head, Adam Mosseri, sharing it in a post.
According to the company, Replace Audio is another step in its efforts to give creators more control over their content.
For creators and brands on Instagram, a post’s likes, comments, shares and reach are worth keeping, and the previous delete-and-reupload method reset them.
Swapping a track can help a post keep pace with current trends on Instagram, or bring older content in line with what its owner is listening to now.
Users reach the tool by opening the post, tapping the three-dot menu in its top-right corner, scrolling to the Edit option and then choosing the audio to replace.
The launch is the latest in a run of music features the Meta-owned platform has rolled out over the past three years, many of them as it competes with TikTok.
Music has spread across much of the app in that time, from single feed photos to carousels, Reels and Instagram Notes.
In 2023, Instagram began letting users set music to photo carousels, a launch it marked with a carousel from Olivia Rodrigo soundtracked by her single bad idea right?
In July 2024, the company launched a multitrack audio tool for Reels, letting creators layer up to 20 tracks on a single clip.
The tool also lets creators fold in text, stickers, and clips while editing a Reel.
“When you do this, you’ll also create your own unique audio mix that fans can save and reuse,” Mosseri said at the time.
That October, Instagram added a Spotify integration that lets listeners save songs they hear in the app straight to their Spotify library with one tap.
To use it, listeners first connect their Spotify account to their Instagram profile.
That move followed TikTok‘s Add to Music App feature, which had linked the app to streaming services roughly a year earlier.
In February 2025, the company brought music into direct messages, letting users send 30-second song previews in private chats and broadcast channels.
That feature was available globally on iOS and Android from launch, with JENNIE and Doechii among the first artists to test it through their broadcast channels.
The tools rest on Meta‘s licensing deals with rightsholders, among them a renewed agreement with Merlin, the body that represents independent music companies and says it accounts for 15% of the recorded music market.
Merlin‘s membership includes Because Music, Downtown Music and Reservoir Media, and it first licensed its members’ catalogs to Facebook in 2018.
Meta has called audio “an important hook to drive Reels engagement,” and offers royalty-free songs to advertisers on the format.
The company also runs revenue-sharing deals with Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group, both struck in 2022, that give the majors and their artists a cut of revenue from licensed music on Facebook.Music Business Worldwide
