Twitter does not currently allow for embedded Instagram photos, and the results are pretty ugly. When you post a photo from Instagram to Twitter, it shows up as a link to Instagram’s website. This isn’t Twitter’s fault, so don’t hate the micro-blogging site, hate the game. Or hate Facebook… post-buyout, Instagram decided not to support Twitter Cards, the system Twitter set up to allow users and developers to attach media to their tweets.
As they are on opposing teams in the Great Social Media Wars, it’s unlikely Instagram will start supporting Twitter Cards anytime soon, which is why Wired reporter Michael Calore generously shared his hack to get around it, which involves using Tumblr. But if you use a service called IFTTT, there’s an even simpler workaround than this.
Sign up for IFTTT
IFTTT (which stands for “If this, than that”) is a crazy wonderful service that helps you connect all the stuff you use on the Internet. It lets you create “recipes” to link up different services you use, and Instagram and Twitter are among these services. Some popular recipes include automatically backing up iPhone photos through email, and automatically cross-posting from Twitter to Facebook. Signing up is free, and just requires a valid email address.
IFTTT used to have a beef with Twitter, but that’s all done now. And an IFTTT user called djuiceman created a recipe that allows you to post your Instagram photos directly onto Twitter.
So once you sign up, go to djuiceman’s recipe and click “Use Recipe.”
If you haven’t already activated your Twitter and Instagram channels, you will need to go through that authentification process, which only takes a minute. Once you activate the recipe, a trigger will fire whenever you upload a photo to Instagram, automatically posting it to Twitter.
Upload your photos and be the envy of everyone who hasn’t figured this out yet
Now you have all your social media photo ducks in a line. Start using that Toaster filter. Every time you take an Instagram photo, IFTTT will activate its recipe to post them to Twitter. Boom. Your Instagram photo will be embedded on Twitter, caption and all.
RIP summer #latergram http://t.co/qh8A2O0OFV pic.twitter.com/j39j6rPsLn
— Kate Knibbs (@KateKnibbs) October 1, 2013
