InstaAnalyzer: An AI Instagram Analyst Powered by PHP, Neuron AI and Bright Data

First Words First of all, I’d like to say thanks for considering reading my article. I really want to win this hackathon! As a Brazilian developer and an immigrant in Portugal, I’m currently open to work and have put a lot of time into developing this project. I hope it’ll help me show companies what I can do and land a job. I’d be very thankful if you could react to my article and share it! :) What I Built Scrape. Analyze. Optimize. Let AI decode Instagram profiles for you. Everyone wants to know info about Instagram profiles whether it’s about yourself or someone else. This AI tool helps you understand profiles of people you’re curious about, even if you’re not on their friends list. It brings you insights in an easy and friendly way! To make this happen, I used some cool technologies, which I’ll explain in this article. Most of the tools are free, and Bright Data even gives free credits to every user to test their product. That means you can try the code below on your own machine after signing up with Bright Data! Demo (MCP Server) I’ve shared a GitHub demo repo so you can clone and try the project yourself. Just a heads up you’ll need API keys from the platforms I mention to see it working. Repository with the PHP API plus Bright Data MCP Server please leave a star if you like it! Demo (REST API) You can test this project live! Just type an Instagram username, and you’ll get all the info formatted in a nice front-end. Plus, you can share it on your own Instagram like the Spotify Wrapper feature! This would help me grow the project and get more eyes on this article. I’d be super thankful! Live Demo How I Used Bright Data's Infrastructure First Project (MCP Server) For this project, I connected straight to Bright Data’s MCP server and used their Scraper API. It gave me access to these awesome tools: web_data_instagram_profiles (Quickly read structured Instagram profile data) web_data_instagram_posts (Quickly read structured Instagram post data) web_data_instagram_reels (Quickly read structured Instagram reels data) web_data_instagram_comments (Quickly read structured Instagram comments data) These worked great and gave my LLM model from Mistral the right data to analyze. I also used the Web Unlocker API to solve captchas and get proxies super helpful to avoid Instagram blocks, especially with private profiles! Second Project (REST API) For this one, I used Bright Data’s REST Scraper API to grab Instagram profile data. Here’s an example request: curl -H "Authorization: Bearer API_TOKEN" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d '[{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/catsofinstagram}]' "https://api.brightdata.com/datasets/v3/trigger?dataset_id=xxxxxxxxx" I also used their webhooks to get a notification when the scraping was done. It was so easy to set up, and then I just showed the data in my front-end app for the user. Live Demo Performance Improvements Here’s what I’d like to do next: Publish the MCP Server Build a custom scraper with Bright Data for specific Instagram data Add RAG search using Bright Data’s Instagram dataset Use all available Instagram REST endpoints to make the REST API even better Conclusion Bright Data is an amazing platform! It lets you use your AI skills to create real-life projects that solve business problems. Their tech infrastructure is awesome, and everything just works. I loved working with their tools and can’t wait to keep using them. Their interface and setup are so easy and straightforward it’ll definitely take your project to the next level! References Bright Data MCP GitHub Bright Data Documentation

May 19, 2025 - 23:20

InstaAnalyzer: An AI Instagram Analyst Powered by PHP, Neuron AI and Bright Data

First Words

First of all, I’d like to say thanks for considering reading my article. I really want to win this hackathon! As a Brazilian developer and an immigrant in Portugal, I’m currently open to work and have put a lot of time into developing this project. I hope it’ll help me show companies what I can do and land a job. I’d be very thankful if you could react to my article and share it! :)

What I Built

Scrape. Analyze. Optimize. Let AI decode Instagram profiles for you.

Everyone wants to know info about Instagram profiles whether it’s about yourself or someone else. This AI tool helps you understand profiles of people you’re curious about, even if you’re not on their friends list. It brings you insights in an easy and friendly way!

To make this happen, I used some cool technologies, which I’ll explain in this article. Most of the tools are free, and Bright Data even gives free credits to every user to test their product. That means you can try the code below on your own machine after signing up with Bright Data!

Demo (MCP Server)

I’ve shared a GitHub demo repo so you can clone and try the project yourself. Just a heads up you’ll need API keys from the platforms I mention to see it working.

Repository with the PHP API plus Bright Data MCP Server please leave a star if you like it!

Demo (REST API)

You can test this project live! Just type an Instagram username, and you’ll get all the info formatted in a nice front-end. Plus, you can share it on your own Instagram like the Spotify Wrapper feature! This would help me grow the project and get more eyes on this article. I’d be super thankful!

Live Demo

How I Used Bright Data's Infrastructure

First Project (MCP Server)

For this project, I connected straight to Bright Data’s MCP server and used their Scraper API. It gave me access to these awesome tools:

web_data_instagram_profiles (Quickly read structured Instagram profile data)
web_data_instagram_posts (Quickly read structured Instagram post data)
web_data_instagram_reels (Quickly read structured Instagram reels data)
web_data_instagram_comments (Quickly read structured Instagram comments data)

These worked great and gave my LLM model from Mistral the right data to analyze. I also used the Web Unlocker API to solve captchas and get proxies super helpful to avoid Instagram blocks, especially with private profiles!

Second Project (REST API)

For this one, I used Bright Data’s REST Scraper API to grab Instagram profile data. Here’s an example request:

curl -H "Authorization: Bearer API_TOKEN" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d '[{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/catsofinstagram}]' "https://api.brightdata.com/datasets/v3/trigger?dataset_id=xxxxxxxxx"

I also used their webhooks to get a notification when the scraping was done. It was so easy to set up, and then I just showed the data in my front-end app for the user.

Live Demo

Performance Improvements

Here’s what I’d like to do next:

Publish the MCP Server
Build a custom scraper with Bright Data for specific Instagram data
Add RAG search using Bright Data’s Instagram dataset
Use all available Instagram REST endpoints to make the REST API even better

Conclusion

Bright Data is an amazing platform! It lets you use your AI skills to create real-life projects that solve business problems. Their tech infrastructure is awesome, and everything just works. I loved working with their tools and can’t wait to keep using them. Their interface and setup are so easy and straightforward it’ll definitely take your project to the next level!