What's Inside Your Instagram Data Export? (2026)

The files that matter

• followers_1.json — everyone who follows you, with the date they followed and a link to their profile. Large accounts get the list split into followers_2.json, followers_3.json and so on.
• following.json— everyone you follow, with the date you followed them. Comparing this list against your followers is how you find who doesn't follow you back.

The other files you might see

Depending on your account activity, the same folder can also contain files for blocked accounts, close friends, pending follow requests you've sent, accounts you've recently unfollowed, hashtags you follow, and accounts whose stories or posts you've hidden. They follow the same structure — lists of profile links with timestamps. If you exported your entireaccount instead of just Followers and following, you'll also see folders for messages, media, comments, ads data, and more — which is why the full export takes hours or days while the followers-only export takes minutes.

The other files in Followers and following, and how they're structured

Beyond the two main lists, the followers_and_following folder usually holds a handful of smaller files, each present only if you have used the feature:

• recently_unfollowed_profiles.json — accounts you unfollowed in roughly the last few weeks. This is the closest the export comes to an unfollow history, and it only covers your own unfollows, not people who unfollowed you.
• pending_follow_requests.json— private accounts you have requested to follow that haven't accepted yet. Useful for a cleanup, since these never show in your following count.
• close_friends.json — your Close Friends list.
• blocked_profiles.json — accounts you have blocked, with the date of the block.

Every one of these, including following.json, uses the same shape. The file is a list of entries, and each entry has a string_list_data array containing one object with three fields: href (the profile URL), value (the username) and timestamp (Unix seconds). The followers file is a bare list of those entries; following.json wraps the list in a relationships_following key. That consistency is what lets an export analyzer read every list the same way, and it's why you can export your followers list to a clean CSV of username, profile link and date without any manual parsing.

JSON vs HTML format

Instagram offers the export in two formats. HTML (the default) gives you pages you can open in a browser and read; JSONgives you the same data in a machine-readable structure. For comparing lists, JSON is the better choice — it's unambiguous and complete. UnfollowChecker reads both, but JSON is the format we recommend selecting.

A note on what the export can't tell you

The export is a snapshot of the moment Instagram generated it. It doesn't include accounts that have since been deactivated or renamed, and it can't tell you whensomeone unfollowed you — only who follows you right now. That's also why a dropping follower count needs a fresh export to investigate.

Turn the export into answers

You could open the two JSON files and compare them by hand — or upload the ZIP to UnfollowChecker and see every account that doesn't follow you back in seconds. Everything runs in your browser; the export never leaves your device.