Impressions
Impressions are the total number of times a post was seen, counting every view — including repeat views by the same person — so the count runs higher than reach.
Impressions count how many times a post was displayed on screen. Every view is one impression, including repeat views: if the same person sees your post three times — once in the feed, once when they return, once from a friend's repost — that is three impressions, from one viewer.
This is the key distinction people miss:
- Impressions — total times shown. Repeat views all count.
- Reach — the number of unique people who saw it. Each person counts once.
Because of that, impressions are always equal to or higher than reach, and the gap between them tells you something. A high impressions-to-reach ratio means the same audience is seeing your post repeatedly — a sign it is resonating and being reshared inside a network, rather than spreading to new people.
Why it matters: impressions are the headline number X shows under every post, so they are the first thing anyone judges "how big did this get" by. But they measure exposure, not audience size. For a campaign you usually care about both — total exposure (impressions) and how many distinct people you actually touched (reach).
A quick example: a post with 100,000 impressions and 40,000 reach was seen, on average, 2.5 times per person. To turn that exposure into followers, see how to grow real followers on Twitter/X.