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🚀 Day 9: Automating Likes and Follows on Instagram using Selenium

In today's lesson, you'll learn how to automate liking posts and following users on Instagram using Selenium. This involves locating dynamic elements like the Like and Follow buttons and interacting with them in a loop.

🎯 What You'll Learn Today

✅ Locate and interact with Like and Follow buttons.
✅ Handle dynamic content using for loops and if conditions.
✅ Add random delays to mimic human behavior.
✅ Implement a simple bot to like posts on a hashtag page.

🖥️ Step-by-Step Guide

🛠️ 1. Setting Up Your Project

Make sure you have:

- Python installed.
- Selenium installed using: pip install selenium
- ChromeDriver downloaded and set up.

🔍 2. Locating Like and Follow Buttons Using XPath

Open Instagram, log in, and visit a hashtag page (e.g., https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/python/). Inspect the Like button using Chrome Developer Tools:

Right-click on the heart icon and click Inspect.
Find the XPath for the button.

Example XPath for the Like button:

Similarly, find the Follow button:

💻 3. Writing Code to Automate Likes

Here's how to write a bot to like the first 5 posts on a hashtag page:

from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service
import time

# Set up the WebDriver
service = Service("path/to/chromedriver")
driver = webdriver.Chrome(service=service)

# Open Instagram and log in
driver.get("https://www.instagram.com/")
time.sleep(3)  # Wait for the page to load

# Enter credentials
driver.find_element(By.NAME, "username").send_keys("your_username")
driver.find_element(By.NAME, "password").send_keys("your_password")
driver.find_element(By.XPATH, "//button[@type='submit']").click()
time.sleep(5)  # Wait for login to complete

# Navigate to a hashtag page
driver.get("https://www.instagram.com/explore/tags/python/")
time.sleep(5)

# Find and like the first 5 posts
posts = driver.find_elements(By.XPATH, "//a[contains(@href, '/p/')]")
for i in range(5):
    posts[i].click()
    time.sleep(2)

    # Click the Like button
    like_button = driver.find_element(By.XPATH, "//button[@aria-label='Like']")
    like_button.click()
    time.sleep(2)

    # Close the post
    driver.find_element(By.XPATH, "//button[@aria-label='Close']").click()
    time.sleep(2)

# Close the browser
driver.quit()

🤖 4. Automating Follows

To automate following users on a profile page:

# Visit a profile page
driver.get("https://www.instagram.com/username/")
time.sleep(3)

# Click the Follow button if it exists
try:
    follow_button = driver.find_element(By.XPATH, "//button[text()='Follow']")
    follow_button.click()
    print("Followed the user!")
except:
    print("Already following or button not found.")

⏱️ 5. Adding Random Delays to Mimic Human Behavior

Instagram may detect repetitive, fast actions as bot activity. To avoid this, add random delays:

import random

# Random delay between actions
time.sleep(random.randint(3, 10))

✅ 6. Task for Today

Create a bot that:

1. Logs into Instagram.
2. Navigates to a hashtag page of your choice.
3. Likes the first 5 posts.
4. Follows the profile of the post author.

⚙️ Next Steps

Tomorrow, we'll explore headless mode, user-agent modifications, and proxy settings to avoid detection.

Would you like me to share more advanced tips to make your bot undetectable? 😊

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