Instagram Recommendations Feel Off? Tune Them Before You Reset

The latest statement confirms direction, not a same-day global launch

During Meta’s July 29 earnings call, the company said Instagram users can visit a Your Algo page and write natural-language prompts to tune recommendations. The important change is direct input: people do not have to rely only on what Instagram infers from taps, watch time, and shares.

That does not prove that every account now has the same control. Meta’s May product guidance said Your Algorithm was available on Reels and Explore in English-speaking countries and would come to the main Feed. If you cannot find it, your language, region, account, or app version may not be included yet.

Use Your Algorithm when a few topics are the problem

Your Algorithm shows topics Instagram associates with your interests and lets you remove subjects you do not want or add ones you would like to see more often. Independent reporting says those topic controls expanded from Reels and Explore to recommendations in the main Feed.

If you still enjoy cooking videos but want fewer travel promotions after watching one long clip, a full reset is unnecessary. A specific adjustment—such as adding home cooking or beginner running and removing an unwanted topic—makes the intended change easier to understand.

If the control appears, change a small group of topics at a time

Look around the recommendation surfaces for Your Algo or Your Algorithm, then read the interests Instagram currently associates with you. Adjust a few more-or-less topics rather than rewriting everything at once. The entry point and wording may differ by language and app version.

Do not judge the result after only a handful of posts. Use Instagram normally for a while and notice which recommendations change. Conflicting behavior can muddy the signal: if you ask for less of a topic but continue watching and saving it, similar recommendations can return.

• Find the clearly incorrect interests in the current topic list.
• Adjust only a few more-or-less topics in one pass.
• Use Not interested on individual unwanted recommendations too.
• Check whether viewing, saving, and liking now match your stated preference.

If the menu is missing, use explicit signals and chosen feeds

You can still shape recommendations without Your Algorithm. Open the three-dot menu on an unwanted recommended post and choose Not interested. Hidden Words can reduce recommendations containing particular words or phrases.

Use Following or Favorites when you want to start with accounts you deliberately chose. Also review old follows, saved posts, and habitual likes. If those signals remain unchanged, recommendations can drift back toward the same subjects.

Reserve Reset suggested content for a feed that is wrong almost everywhere

A clean restart can make more sense when Explore, Reels, and Feed all feel far removed from your current interests. Meta’s published path is Profile, the three-bar More options menu, Content preferences, then Reset suggested content. Review the prompt before confirming the reset.

A reset does not leave the feed blank forever. Recommendations personalize again from the content and accounts you interact with afterward. Meta also offers a chance to review followed accounts during the reset, which matters when old follows are part of the problem.

The simplest rule is tune a narrow problem and reset a broad one

When only one or two subjects are unwelcome and the rest of the feed still works, start with topic controls or Not interested. Consider a reset when the account’s interests have been heavily mixed over time and all three recommendation surfaces feel unfamiliar.

Neither option guarantees a permanently perfect feed. What you watch, save, like, and follow continues to shape recommendations after the change. Make a small, memorable set of adjustments so you can tell which choice actually helped.