based on analyzing 2,384,083 pieces of content by npdigital Source

Instagram Reels should be

• 11 to 17 seconds long if their focus is entertainment.
• 38 to 51 seconds long if educational.

Carousels should be

• 7 to 10 slides long, but you have to use a hook on slide 1 AND slide 2 for it to work well.

• Short-form videos should be 40 to 46 seconds long.
• Long-from should be 3 to 4 minutes long.
• Text should be 20 to 38 words long if motivational.
• Text should 291 words long on average if educational

Text should be

• 14 to 21 words long if motivational.
• 9 to 35 words if entertaining.
• 173 words long on average if educational.

Videos should be

• 18 to 31 seconds long if entertaining.
• 42 to 54 seconds long if educational.

YouTube Shorts should be

• 28 to 33 seconds long if entertaining.
• 41 to 57 seconds long if educational.

Long-form videos performed the best if they were on

• average 7 minutes and 9 seconds long

In most cases the reach sucked no matter what the length of the content was…

Use the above data as a guide, and don’t add fluff to your content to stretch it out. Don’t cut your content to make it shorter if your content is amazing! The data above should be a guide. Being off a few seconds or words isn’t a big deal.

Professional photos had 20.8% fewer likes and 35.1 fewer comments.

Now there were a few rare cases where professional photos (and normal ones) did really well… such as posting an engagement photo, a wedding photo, or a baby gender reveal photo…

But overall people resonate more with normal photos.

Don’t overthink it. Especially if you are a large corporation.

Sure, you still want your images to be clear, the angles to be right, and even the lighting to be good. But you don’t need to hire a professional photographer to take pictures. People want casual photos that are “real” as they tend to be more relatable.

Source