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Own Your Memories

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Own Your Memories

by Alvaro Gómez

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Description

Own Your Memories turns an Instagram data export (JSON format) into native WordPress posts. Before the import runs, you choose exactly how your content lands:

  • Post type — import as Posts, Pages, or any custom post type registered on your site.
  • Status — Published, Private, or Draft.
  • Tag / term — optionally assign every imported post to an existing or new taxonomy term.

Once you confirm those settings and upload your ZIP, the importer gets to work:

  • One WordPress post is created per source Instagram post.
  • Carousels become Gutenberg gallery blocks; single photos and videos are embedded individually.
  • The caption becomes the post title (truncated) and the excerpt (full).
  • The post content contains the media and the caption is added underneath.
  • Hashtags are converted into WordPress tags.
  • Original creation dates are preserved and adjusted to your site’s timezone.
  • The first image in each post is set as the featured image.
  • All media is stored in your site’s media library.

What is not imported:

  • Stories
  • Reels
  • Profile photos
  • Saved items

How to get your export

  1. Open Instagram Settings Accounts Center Your information and permissions Download your information.
  2. Choose JSON format (this importer does not read HTML exports).
  3. Select Posts (other items are ignored by the importer).
  4. Select the desired date range.
  5. Wait for the email, download the ZIP, and upload it via Tools Import Own Your Memories in your WordPress admin.
  1. Upload the own-your-memories folder to /wp-content/plugins/.
  2. Activate the plugin via the Plugins menu in WordPress.
  3. Visit Tools Import Own Your Memories and upload your ZIP.
  1. The plugin registers itself in Tools - Import alongside WordPress's built-in importers. Click "Run Importer" to start.

    The plugin registers itself in Tools - Import alongside WordPress's built-in importers. Click "Run Importer" to start.

  2. The plugin will let you assign the post, status, and category (term) before it imports all posts & media.

    The plugin will let you assign the post, status, and category (term) before it imports all posts & media.

My ZIP is huge — will this work?

The importer raises PHP’s memory limit while running, but very large exports (thousands of posts and gigabytes of media) may still hit server limits. Try requesting different ZIP files to Instagram (one per year, for instance) or run on a host that allows long-running admin scripts.

Do I need to keep the ZIP after importing?

No. The plugin deletes the uploaded ZIP from your media library after the import completes.

Will my new posts be imported automatically to my WordPress site?

No. Own Your Memories is a one-off migration tool to help you move your existing content into WordPress. Ongoing or automatic syncing of new posts is out of scope for this plugin.

Why are some posts missing?

Stories and reels are intentionally skipped. If feed posts are missing, ensure you exported in JSON (not HTML) and selected the Posts category.

0.3.3

  • Fixed: the “Label / term” field on the pre-import screen still did not update when switching the “Import as” post type. The assets/js/importer-admin.js file referenced by the plugin was never actually included in the package (despite the 0.3.2 changelog note) and wp_enqueue_script() was failing silently. The script has now been added to the plugin and correctly swaps in the taxonomy-specific markup that WordPress already localizes to the page via wp_localize_script().

0.3.2

  • Fixed: the “Label / term” field on the pre-import screen was not updating when switching the “Import as” post type. The admin JS file responsible for this behavior (assets/js/importer-admin.js) was missing from the 0.3.1 package; it has been added and is now properly enqueued.

0.3.1

  • Fixed: the “Import as” post type dropdown on the pre-import screen which had stopped updating when switching post types.

0.3.0

  • Added support for custom post types (CPTs) — you can now import Instagram posts into any public or UI-accessible post type registered on your site.
  • Added pre-import settings: choose the post type, publish status, and an optional taxonomy term to assign before the import runs.

0.2.0

  • Initial release.
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