Instagram's latest mistake is why you should backup all your stories from now on!

That's why you should back up all your Stories in the future.

What exactly is the Instagram error? Does it affect all users?

Instagram Stories are one of the best ways to preserve your memories. After 24 hours, any Stories you post are automatically stored in the Archive section.

You can leave them in the Archive or add them to your Highlights so your followers can see them after the first 24 hours. While there are alternative solutions you can use to add images and videos to your Instagram Highlights, using Stories archive is the simplest method.

Unfortunately, a technical error affected some images and videos saved in the Stories archive , resulting in permanent deletion. Although the company stated in the announcement that it has now fixed the error, it means that lost Stories cannot be recovered.

CNN reported that Meta declined to reveal exactly how many users were affected by the bug. However, it seems that this error is quite common, especially for people who post frequently and have many Highlights.

To check if Stories have been permanently deleted, go to your Instagram profile, tap the three-line icon and select Archive under the How you use Instagram heading . If you see a message titled "A technical issue affecting some of your archived stories", some of your Stories have been permanently deleted.

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Another way to check is to go to your Instagram profile and check for available Highlights. If Highlight's cover photo has been replaced with a warning icon, that means a technical error has affected those Stories as well.

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When you click on Highlight with the warning icon, you will again see a message saying "This story is no longer available".

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All affected Stories will be automatically removed from your Archives in July 2025.

Don't just rely on Instagram, proactively back up your content!

If your Story is affected by the error, there's nothing you can do now. Although you'll see the Remove affected stories option at the same time, you can't manually save them to your device or view deleted Stories.

The best way is to learn from this experience and back up your content in the future. When uploading a Story, simply tap the three horizontal dots in the upper right corner and select Save from the drop-down menu to save to the camera roll.

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If you don't want to manually save every image or video you post to your Story, you can turn on the option to automatically save every Story you post to your camera roll.

To do this, switch to the Home tab and swipe left to reveal the camera. Then, tap the Settings icon in the upper right corner of the screen and tap Story . Finally, turn on the switch next to Save story to camera roll .

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Certainly, if you're sharing a funny meme or Reel you saw, you don't necessarily need to save it elsewhere, as losing it won't hurt. However, if you're posting a picture of you and your friends hanging out or a video of a pet you don't want to lose, backing up is always a good idea.

This way, you can restore your data in case something like this happens again. You have many different backup options, such as different cloud storage services like iCloud or Google Drive or physical storage like USB, memory card or external hard drive.

Regardless of which data backup method you choose, after this incident, you should not trust a single company with your data, even if it is a large company like Meta. After losing many memories saved on Instagram, take the time to back up all the images and videos saved on Snapchat. After all, you never know when you'll need to restore data.

Samuel Daniel

Update 22 August 2024