One of the biggest parts of using Instagram Reels is utilizing trending sounds. While there are several factors that go into creating a successful Reel, the use of engaging, on-trend audio is definitely one of the most important in staying relevant and authentic with your audience. Using the right audio trend in a unique and engaging way can make a significant difference in your Reels strategy (and results) - it can bring you higher engagement, more reach, and fresh eyes to your content, which ultimately can lead to more follows, subscriptions, and even leads!
But how do you decide which audio trends to jump on? How do you even know which audio is currently taking off, and where do you find it? Well, that’s exactly what I am going to teach you today so let’s jump right into it!
What are trending songs on Reels?
Trending songs on Reels refers to those that are gaining popularity on the platform, however, just because a certain song or sound has been used a lot, doesn’t mean that it’s trending. You can also find audio that has been featured in hundreds of thousands of Reels but isn’t trending, or you can find audios that have only been used a few times but are trending. Take a look at these for example.
The audios on the left only have a little over 2900 and 5000 videos but are still trending (you can identify a trending sound by the little arrow that is pointing upwards), whereas those on the right have over 100k and nearly 200k videos! So, as you can see, the amount of times an audio has been used has nothing to do with a sound trending.
But how is that possible? The key is momentum. For example, when people are suddenly using a specific audio more, they are creating more Reels from tapping the audio or they are saving the audio to use for later - that’s why the audio is trending.
How do you find trending songs for your Instagram Reels?
Now, finding trending sounds for Instagram Reels is fairly straightforward yet a bit tedious and time-consuming. Unfortunately, there is no explicit “Trending” list (well, actually there is because we created a service for you, but I’ll explain more about that in a bit). For now, let’s look at the most common ways to find trending soundtracks:
“Just keep scrolling”
The first way to find trending sounds is pretty straightforward. Open Instagram and head to the Reels Explore page, which is the center icon. From there, you can scroll through Reels that Instagram recommends for you, based on the niche that you are in, the accounts that you follow, and the content that you like. All you have to do now is scroll, scroll, scroll, watch a bunch of Reels and look out for the “trending” arrow that I mentioned before.
When you come across a sound you like, tap on it and it’ll take you to that audio, where you can view other videos that use it. On that page, there will be an option to “save audio,” which will add it to your personal audio collection or you can start creating with the audio directly from this page.
Take a look at the Reels’ audio library
The second way to find trending soundtracks is to use the music library. When creating a Reel in the Instagram app, you can tap on the music icon to add audio from Instagram’s own library. This will bring up a screen with audio recommendations specifically for you, as well as a search bar where you can look for music or sounds. Now, the only disadvantage here is that you won’t know which sound is trending right now as there is no arrow shown underneath the sound. Typically, if Instagram is showing you a sound here, it’s trending on the app, but there is no way to know with 100% certainty. You also don’t see how others use the sound, which makes it hard to jump on trends. Personally, we never choose our soundtracks that way. We only use this library to access our saved audio. Also, keep in mind, that this library is limited by copyright laws, so Instagram business accounts will have limited access to music.
Make use of the hashtag page
If you are not sure if a trending song matches your niche you can also use the hashtag page. Even though we believe that most trends can be applied across all niches, it can happen that a certain audio is seen mostly with travel content, but never with food content, just because it doesn’t match or resonate with it.
In that case, open your explore page and type in a hashtag that is related to what you do, let’s say #travelinfluencer. Go to the “tags” tab next, click on one of the hashtags, and here you’ll find multiple Reels under the “reels” tab. This is a great way to find audios that are mainly used by other accounts with similar content to you. Start scrolling through the different Reels again and see which one of the sounds is trending.
Get inspired on TikTok
A large number of trending audios originate on TikTok. Oftentimes you find soundtracks on Reels days or weeks after they had already gone viral on TikTok. Knowing this, you can head over to TikTok and find up-and-coming sounds there. For example, at the time of writing this blog post, the song “Only Love Can Hurt Like This (Slowed down version)” was trending on TikTok. This is what happened after searching for it on Instagram:
With only 6000 Reels featuring it, the song is just starting to trend, which makes it a great opportunity for you to use it and to be featured on the Reels Explore page! This is, of course, a bit of a guessing game and some trends that you find on TikTok can’t really be translated to Reels, but most of them do just fine! Just make sure that you never post a video to Instagram that you already uploaded onto TikTok and that has the watermark on it. Instagram will detect that and penalize you by not showing it to as many people.
Check out what other creators are doing
The next option you have is to check out what other creators are doing. Understanding and seeing what other accounts in your niche are doing is actually super important. If you see what works well for them, you can take the idea and make it your own. Of course, don’t copy what others are doing but check out which sounds other creators are using and how they are using them! If you see that one of these soundtracks is currently trending and that you can make it your own, don’t wait around - go for it!
Subscribe to SooTrendy and let us do the work for you
You might have noticed by now that every single way to find trending soundtracks is very time-consuming. From endlessly scrolling through your feed, to deciding which trend you should jump onto and of course creating the Reel itself and making sure your photos and videos match the beat - trust us, we feel the same. Don’t you think that all those hours and energy could be better used elsewhere?
Well, that’s exactly what we thought and for that reason, we decided to build SooTrendy, a tool that will do all the hard work for you! To speed up your process of creating good Reels and TikToks, we identify the best weekly trends for you, find the right audio, and even create video editing templates for you as well! We compile it all together for you in an exclusive member’s database and send a weekly wrap-up straight into your inbox!
We already had a handful of our students try out our new services and this is what they have to say:
If you would like to find out more about SooTrendy you can check it out here.
And there you have it! Six different ways to find trending audios and soundtracks so create content that leaves people in aww. Make sure you tag @clublifedesign and @sootrendyclub whenever you post a Reel so that we can check out your work and share it with our community!
Cheers,
