Getting a HikerAPI token¶

insta-dl-gui talks to Instagram exclusively through HikerAPI — a paid managed API. Your Instagram account is never involved: no login, no session, nothing to ban.

Sign up at hikerapi.com — the first 100 requests are free, no credit card required.
Open your HikerAPI dashboard and copy your token.
In insta-dl-gui, paste the token into the first-launch screen and press Connect.

The token is stored locally in the app config (0600 permissions on macOS/Linux) and never leaves your machine except in requests to api.hikerapi.com.

How much does a download cost?¶

One request ≈ one API call. Typical costs:

Action	Requests
Fetch a single post/reel	1
Profile preview (what you see before downloading)	2
Feed pagination	1 per page (~12–18 posts each)
Reels pagination	1 per clips page
Followers or Following pagination	1 per page
Search a Followers or Following list	1
Stories	2
Highlights listing	2
Each highlight reel's items	1 per reel

The remaining balance is always visible in the app header; click it to refresh. If quota runs out before any file is saved, the job fails with a link to top up. If some files were already saved, the job finishes with that exact count; top up and re-run to fetch the rest. Media CDN downloads themselves are free and unlimited.

Tip

Use the Max field to cap how many posts a profile job considers — handy for testing a big profile before committing quota to the whole archive.

Rotating or removing a token¶

Open Settings → HikerAPI token, paste the replacement and press Replace token. The app validates it first; a rejected token leaves the current token active.

To remove the token without deleting the download folder preference or metadata setting, close the app and remove only the token field from config.json. The next launch returns to the connection screen. Config locations:

macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/insta-dl-gui/config.json
Linux: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/insta-dl-gui/config.json or ~/.config/insta-dl-gui/config.json
Windows: %APPDATA%\insta-dl-gui\