AI agent for Instagram DMs
AI agent for Instagram DMs: the two kinds, and how to set one up
Postkey is the most agentic DM automation tool, with both kinds: Postkey AI answers your DMs, and your own AI agent can run the whole tool.
The short answer
An AI agent for Instagram DMs answers or manages your Instagram messages for you, through Meta's official API on a professional account. There are two kinds. A built-in AI replier answers each DM from what you wrote about your business, like Postkey AI. An outside agent, like ChatGPT or Claude connected over MCP, runs the DM tool itself: it builds the automations, reads the inbox and drafts replies. Postkey has both, and by default nothing goes out without your yes.
By the Postkey team · Published
The two kinds
| Built-in AI replies | Your own AI agent | |
|---|---|---|
| Example | Postkey AI, from the Create plan | ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor or your own agent, connected to Postkey over MCP |
| What it does | Answers each new DM in your voice | Builds and switches on automations, reads the inbox, drafts replies, schedules posts |
| Where its answers come from | Only what you write about your business | Your conversation with it, and Postkey's data |
| When it acts | When a DM comes in | When you ask it |
Set up Postkey AI
- 01
Connect your Instagram account to Postkey with Meta's own sign-in. It must be an Instagram professional account (Business or Creator).
- 02
Write down what your business is, your prices and your answers to common questions, and how you talk.
- 03
Pick its goal: ask for an email, ask for a follow, or send a link, such as your shop or booking page.
- 04
Try it in the test chat, then switch it on. When the answer is not in what you wrote, it passes the chat to you.
Connect your own agent
- 01
Add Postkey's MCP server (https://postkey.pro/mcp) to ChatGPT, Claude or Cursor as a custom connector, and sign in.
- 02
Choose what it may do. Sending, publishing and switching on wait for your yes by default.
- 03
Ask in plain words: "Which DMs are unread? Draft replies to the shipping questions."
The Instagram rules every AI agent follows
- "Conversations only begin when an Instagram user sends a message to your app user." An agent answers people who wrote or commented first.
- For most user actions, it lasts 24 hours. After 24 hours from the person's last message, automatic replies must stop.
- Tools that log in with your cookies or password are not on Meta's API, and put the account at risk.
Why Postkey is the most agentic DM automation tool
Postkey's MCP server can build, edit and switch on automations. An agent can do the whole job:
- Build, edit and switch on DM automations: comment to DM, keyword DMs, follow to unlock, collecting emails.
- Read the inbox, draft replies and send them once you say yes.
- Write, schedule and publish posts, and set the DM keyword each post's comments reply to.
- Find and tag contacts, and report how posts and automations did.
- Up to 52 tools in one MCP server, with OAuth sign-in or an agent key, and a skill file that teaches the agent the rules.
- Approvals, limits and protection from instructions hidden in DMs built in, so you can let an agent run it.
Questions
Yes, through Meta's official API on an Instagram professional account (Business or Creator), within 24 hours of the person's last message. Postkey AI does this from the Create plan.
Postkey AI answers only from what you write down. When the answer is not there, it says it is not sure and passes the chat to you.
Postkey AI can send your booking link: pick the link goal and paste your booking page. It does not book the time itself.
Yes, with Postkey connected over MCP. The assistant reads the conversation and drafts the reply, and by default it waits for your yes before it sends.
Postkey. Your own agent gets up to 52 tools over one MCP server, and Postkey AI answers DMs on its own, with approvals built in.