15 PHOTO EDITING APPS TO MAKE YOUR INSTAGRAM FEED POP

15 Photo Editing Apps for Instagram

If you don’t know about the social media platform that has made most people realize their hidden photography prowess and made the search for photo editing apps for Instagram become a norm, please tell me what planet you have been dwelling in.

Since its onset, Instagram has successfully given us so many reasons to jump on the bandwagon of Instagram users. Besides being a visually appealing platform, it has fast grown to become a commercial and creativity hub of some sort for businesses, brands and influencers.

Being a visual platform, a lot of emphasis are placed on the quality and beauty of one’s photos. When I started blogging and began to use my Instagram account more often, I constantly worried about getting photos with great quality using my mobile phone. As I couldn’t afford a camera when I started out. It took a while until I realized it isn’t about the equipment but how you use what you have to achieve what you want.

Soon enough, I learnt to be comfortable shooting photos with my phone for “the gram” as almost everyone calls it. Then I learnt another trick, which changed my perception a lot; The trick of editing.

Editing is such a huge deal and for a long while, I thought one needed professional training to edit photos until I started hearing and reading up on photo editing apps for Instagram.

The Struggle For The Most Visually Appealing Photo/Feed on IG is Real

I remember when there was such a big ruckus in the blogosphere because certain bloggers were being very private about what photo editing apps for Instagram they use to achieve an even feed and engaging story and some even expressed their annoyance over how some bloggers constantly bug them over photo editing apps they use for Instagram. However, In Nigeria, a few bloggers decided to stand out and revealed these apps. People like Cassie Daves of CassieDaves.com , Grace Gigi of Epiphany29.com etc.

Since then, I realized the need to carry out research on my own rather than go asking fellow bloggers and I have found a lot of apps that are super amazing, some are well known and some are not so well known.

Here Are My Top 15 Photo Editing Apps For Instagram.

SNAPSEED

OMG, when I first downloaded this app, I was pretty confused, so many features, so many buttons. I couldn’t understand how it worked. So I abandoned it but still a few people kept raving about it and whenever I searched for photo editing apps, Snapseed will always be there. One day I decided that for this app to pop up everywhere plus the fact that it’s developed by Google, it must be good, So I resulted to playing around with the app until I discovered that I’ve found one of the best photo editing apps for Instagram.

Snapseed has about 29 different editing tools that are extremely helpful when used for editing Instagram photos. My favourite feature of Snapseed has to be that one can save previous edits. This is one of the top reasons why it’s the perfect photo editing app for Instagram because all your photos can be made to look alike with just one click.

SELFIE PHOTO EDITOR

I find the name of this app to be quite cliche, like you don’t have to shove it in our faces that it’s a photo editing app.

The Selfie Photo Editor app is a super amazing photo editing app for Instagram. It is mostly for selfies and portrait photos though. You can use the adjustment tool to tweak the brightness, vignette etc. It also comes with a beauty Editor where you can add makeup to your photos.

My favourite feature are their filters. They are so easy to use and so nice. Lastly, this app comes with a photo collage tool. It’s like an all in one package, I love!.

LIGHTROOM

The desktop version of this app is a photo editing Holy Grail. It comes packed with so many features and tools and is mostly used by professional photographers. I think the developers saw the global shift between the usage of desktop to mobile devices and hence created a simplified mobile app version. Don’t be deceived by the word “simplified” as the Lightroom mobile app can work wonders on your photographs.

PREVIEW

Most people know preview to be an Instagram feed curation app, but what most don’t know is it’s fully packed with editing features and filters.

I found out Preview has editing features a while back through a fellow blogger Dear Salmah and ever since then I haven’t looked back. It’s so easy to use the adjustment tool to edit your pictures to your preferred look.

A COLOUR STORY

I found this app by mere chance during one of my usual search on Google play store. What captured my interest was the app description on play store. It simply read “Make your photo colors pop—not fade—with A Color Story”.
I quickly downloaded it and I consider it the perfect dupe for Vscocam. It has tons of pretty amazing filters and I found it a bit more exciting than Vsco especially now Vsco has made most interesting filters to be paid filters. If you love colours, then you will find A Color Story to be one of the coolest photo editing apps for Instagram.

ADOBE PHOTOSHOP EXPRESS

Need I say much? Adobe Photoshop for Desktop is a super amazing Editing software. It’s only natural that the app version be amazing as well.

Photo Editing Apps For Specific Instagram Feed Themes.

Most of the apps already mentioned above can be used to create specific themes for your Instagram feeds. However they are more technical and you might be looking for a simpler method. For example, Snapseed can be used to whiten imgae background as it’s brush tool has a whitening option but it tends to look too bright and you have to still tweak and desaturate a little bit to achieve a natural white looking background whereas with Airbrush or Facetune, the whitening tool comes out looking almost natural. So for a beginner in the world of photo editing, it’s easier and faster to use them

White Instagram Feed Theme

AIRBRUSH OR FACETUNE2

These apps come packed with other photo editing features but they are my go to for whitening background. Airbrush is available for Android users while Facetune2 is available for iPhone users only.

White/Warm/ Tinted Instagram Feed Theme

VSCOCAM

Vscocam has a lot of filters to help you achieve any of the above. Bear in mind that some of the really cool filters must be bought but honestly speaking they are worth it. My favourite Vscocam filter for a white feed is A6

Moody/Vintage Instagram Feed Theme

AFTERLIGHT

This app is awesome. It has so many pretty filters. I absolutely love it. For a Moody or Vintage Instagram Feed theme, I think Afterlight is your go-to photo editing app because it comes with some cool vintage and Moody filters you will love.

Glitters/Lightleaks or Grainy Instagram Feed Theme

For Glitter or lightleaks Instagram theme there is the popular Kira Kira app which I am not a big fan of. There’s also Filter Loop Editor which is a paid app for iPhone users.

There are a lot of apps that gives the Grainy image effect. Most of the apps already mentioned already got a Grainy image tool but my absolute favourites are Mextures and RniFilms. Sadly they are only available for iPhone users which I think is so sad because we Android users deserve to have such amazing apps too (we do have some though). I just wish these two apps will have Android versions, that will be so cool because I am tired of missing out on some amazing apps and features because I don’t use a iPhone. Can we just agree that this is “mobile device racism”. Lol

Text On Image Instagram Feed Theme

The best mobile app for this is definitely Canva. You can do super amazing things with Canva. So many styles, colours and fonts to choose from.

Creativity And Consistency Is Key

Remember when I talked about the big ruckus that occurred because some people got annoyed because people kept asking what photo editing apps they use for Instagram. One reason I didn’t side with those who saw it as a big deal to share was the fact that no two edits can ever be the same except you apply specific filters and even then, the quality of the original image matters.

So I considered it silly because sharing what photo editing apps you use for Instagram doesn’t automatically mean others will follow your editing pattern.

We are all different, our thinking and creativeness varies, so we can all use the same editing app and come out with different results.

One thing I believe every creative should have is creativity. Yes I know for you to be a creative, you must already have some level of creativity. However a lot of creatives tend to forget that and instead of creating something that’s unique, they tend to copy and we all already know that a copy can never be as good as an original, it can come close but it can never match it!

I encourage you to explore each of the apps mentioned here before you write them off. Read/watch how to use tutorials, you can also go further and search for Tutorial videos on YouTube. Let’s all be better together, so we can create more magic!

Did you enjoy this post, please leave a comment, it encourages me to write more valuable content for you. If you know other amazing photo editing apps for Instagram, kindly drop them in the comment section. If you want me to do a similar post on apps to use for Insta Stories, kindly leave a comment below. Cheers!

*All text in purple includes links to apps and websites

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