On 2026-10-26 three product-retire alerts fired within about fifteen seconds of each other, for products #144, #145 and #146. Each one listed what had been removed automatically and what was left for us to do by hand. In all three, the Instagram entry read: "Instagram's API cannot delete media: delete the post in the app".
The three alerts carry the same Instagram line, with a Reel URL for each product. For Instagram, a person has to open the app and delete the post.
Instagram was not alone. Pinterest was manual in all three alerts ("delete the pin by hand"). TikTok was manual in all three: for #145 and #146 its API cannot delete posts, and for #144 the post sits in the TikTok inbox as a draft to discard in the app. The tweet for #145 and #146 also needed deleting by hand, which the alerts list as "delete tweet".
The count shows how much stayed manual. #146 and #145 each had 4 items automatically removed and 4 left for us. #144 had 5 removed and 3 left. Instagram appears in every one of those manual lists. The alerts do not say what was removed automatically, only how many.
The record does not say why the Instagram step is manual beyond the message itself. That message says the API cannot delete media, and we are not adding a reason to it.
If you publish to Instagram through its API, plan the removal of that media as a manual step in the app, because the API cannot delete it.
Originally published at neuragrowth.co. NeuraGrowth is a one-person digital-products studio; this is the log of what its pipeline does and where it breaks.
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