ShortsIntel

Trends and tracking

Track competitors on social media

By . Published 1 November 2026. Updated .

Most competitor tracking is a person opening the same profiles every morning and trying to remember what was there yesterday. It misses the Video that took off overnight and the Ad that quietly stopped running.

This guide shows how to hand that work to your Assistant. You set a Tracker on each competitor Creator, Hashtag, Sound, Keyword or Advertiser. Every day the Tracker checks it and writes a Change Report when something moved. Your Assistant reads those reports and tells you what changed. The guides on Sounds, Hashtags and Platform research are listed at the end of the page.

What a Tracker does

A Tracker is a standing request to watch one thing: a Creator, a Hashtag, a Sound, a Keyword or an Advertiser. Once a day, at 06:00 UTC, each active Tracker runs a cycle. The cycle reads the public data again and compares it with the previous cycle.

If nothing crossed a threshold, you get no Change Report and nothing to read. If something did, the Change Report says what moved, by how much, and which Videos or Ads caused it. The first cycle records the starting point, so Change Reports begin from the second day.

You can group Trackers of one kind into a Collection, such as Competitors or Our accounts, and read the changes for the whole group at once. Reading Trackers, Collections and Change Reports is free. You pay only for the daily cycles.

What you can track, and what counts as a change

Prices are per daily cycle. Turning on analysis for a Tracker adds the analysis price for each new Video or Ad it finds.

Analysis on a Tracker adds 20 credits per new Video or Ad.
TrackerPlatformsA Change Report is written whenPer daily cycle
CreatorTikTok, Instagram, FacebookThe Creator posts new Videos; a Video reaches 3x the Creator's median views; a Video runs at 2x the Creator's usual views per hour; followers move 10% either way; a Video becomes an Ad; bio links change; the verified badge changes.6 credits
HashtagTikTok, InstagramMedian views across the sampled Videos move 25% either way, or a new Video enters the top 10 by views.3 credits
SoundTikTokThe number of Videos using the Sound rises 10% or more, or a different Video becomes its most viewed.6 credits
KeywordTikTok, Instagram, YouTube, FacebookMedian views across the search results move 25% either way, or a new Video enters the top 10 by views.3 credits
AdvertiserMeta Ad Library, TikTok Ad LibraryThe Advertiser starts new Ads, stops Ads, groups more variants under an Ad, or runs an Ad in new countries or placements.30 credits

Data limits

Data limits for tracking

  • Creator Trackers run on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook. YouTube channels cannot be tracked yet, and YouTube Creator data covers Shorts only.
  • Sound Trackers are TikTok only, because Sounds are TikTok only. Hashtag Trackers run on TikTok and Instagram only.
  • Hashtag and Keyword numbers come from one page of Videos read each cycle, not from the Platform's totals, so they are labelled as sampled.
  • Instagram and Facebook Keyword search is best effort, so a Keyword Tracker there may read fewer Videos.
  • The TikTok Ad Library covers Ads shown in the EU/EEA, the UK, Switzerland and Turkey only. A TikTok Advertiser Tracker sees only those Ads.
  • Scores compare a Video with its Creator's usual reach. They come back on every Platform through get_creator; only the score_video tool that scores one Video on demand is TikTok only.
  • A Customer can have up to 100 active Trackers at once. Pause the ones you are not reading.

How to track a competitor with your Assistant

You do this in plain language in Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or any Assistant connected to ShortsIntel. The Assistant uses the track, get_changes and Collection tools for you.

  1. List what to watch

    Write down each competitor's handles on the Platforms they use, their brand page or Advertiser name for Ads, and the Hashtags, Sounds and Keywords your niche lives on. Five to ten targets is enough to start.

  2. Look before you track

    Ask your Assistant to look up each Creator first. A lookup shows their median views and posting rate, and on TikTok which recent Videos beat their usual reach. You then know their normal before the Tracker starts reporting on it.

  3. Start the Trackers

    Ask the Assistant to track each target. It can quote the price of each cycle before it starts. Tracking a target you already track costs nothing.

  4. Group them

    Ask it to put the competitor Trackers in a Collection called Competitors, so one question reads every change in the group.

  5. Narrow and analyse

    Set a Focus such as "mentions protein powder" to hide off-topic Videos, and turn on analysis if you want the hook, format and call to action of each new Video written up.

  6. Read the Change Reports

    Each morning, ask what changed. The Assistant reads the Change Reports for free and summarises them: which competitor posted, which Video took off, which Ads stopped.

Sample output from the house account

Two real reads from our own account, trimmed for length. The first is the Creator lookup you would run before tracking a competitor. The second is the Change Reports of a Hashtag Tracker that has run daily since October 19, 2026.

TikTok, via REST API

Look up @duolingo on TikTok. What is their usual reach, and which recent Videos beat it?

{
  "handle": "duolingo",
  "follower_count": 18375906,
  "baseline": {
    "sample": 19,
    "median_views": 757600,
    "p90_views": 2080000,
    "posts_per_week": 6.25,
    "engagement_rate": 0.1596,
    "confidence": "high"
  },
  "videos": [
    {
      "posted_at": "2026-10-22",
      "description": "so close eddy, you're a pink lafufu. hope this helps!",
      "views": 5900000,
      "scores": { "outlier": 8, "views_per_hour": 24786.16 }
    },
    {
      "posted_at": "2026-10-29",
      "description": "the capital of italy is what??",
      "views": 2000000,
      "scores": { "outlier": 2.71, "percentile": 88.89, "views_per_hour": 28489.49 }
    }
    // 17 more Videos
  ]
}
Captured 1 November 2026. Tools used: get_creator, GET /v1/creators/tiktok/{handle}. Output trimmed; live results change.

TikTok, via REST API

What changed on my booktok Hashtag Tracker over the last week?

{
  "items": [
    {
      "cycle_key": "tiktok:hashtag:booktok:2026-10-30",
      "triggers": ["median_views"],
      "changes": {
        "median_views": { "before": 1500000, "after": 1017500, "change_pct": -32.17, "sample_based": true }
      },
      "summary": "median views down 32% (1.5M to 1M, sampled)"
    },
    {
      "cycle_key": "tiktok:hashtag:booktok:2026-10-29",
      "triggers": ["median_views"],
      "changes": {
        "median_views": { "before": 943900, "after": 1500000, "change_pct": 58.92, "sample_based": true }
      },
      "summary": "median views up 59% (943.9K to 1.5M, sampled)"
    },
    {
      "cycle_key": "tiktok:hashtag:booktok:2026-10-27",
      "triggers": ["median_views"],
      "changes": {
        "median_views": { "before": 468650, "after": 878200, "change_pct": 87.39, "sample_based": true }
      },
      "summary": "median views up 87% (468.7K to 878.2K, sampled)"
    }
    // 2 more Change Reports
  ]
}
Captured 1 November 2026. Tools used: get_changes, GET /v1/trackers/{id}/changes. Output trimmed; live results change.

How to read it

The Creator lookup gives the yardstick. This account's median is about 758K views a Video, and its best recent Video reached 5.9M, 8 times that. A Creator Tracker on this account would write a Change Report the day a new Video crosses 3 times the median.

The Hashtag Tracker shows what a quiet Tracker looks like. Between October 22 and October 30 it wrote five Change Reports, all on median views, and on the other days nothing crossed a threshold. The booktok sample swings by a third or more from one day to the next, so read several days of reports together before you call a rise a trend.

Questions to ask your Assistant

Paste these into any connected Assistant and swap in your own competitors.

  • Look up these three competitors on TikTok and Instagram and tell me each one's median views and posting rate: (paste handles)
  • Track each of them daily and put the Trackers in a Collection called Competitors. Quote the price first.
  • Track this brand as a Meta Advertiser and tell me when they start or stop an Ad: (paste the brand or Page name)
  • Track the Sounds and Hashtags my niche uses most and tell me when one of them starts rising.
  • What changed in my Competitors Collection since Monday? Only show me Videos that beat their Creator's usual reach.

Live trend data and docs

Trends and tracking guides

Questions

How do I track competitors on social media?
Set a Tracker on each competitor Creator or Advertiser, and on the Hashtags, Sounds and Keywords you share with them. Each Tracker checks its target once a day and writes a Change Report when something moves. Ask your Assistant to read the Change Reports instead of opening every profile yourself.
Which Platforms can I track competitors on?
Creators on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook; Hashtags on TikTok and Instagram; Sounds on TikTok; Keywords on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and Facebook; and Advertisers in the Meta Ad Library and the TikTok Ad Library. YouTube channels cannot be tracked yet.
How often do Trackers check?
Once a day, at 06:00 UTC. You can also ask for a cycle now, which costs the same as a scheduled one.
How much does competitor tracking cost?
Each daily cycle has a price per Tracker kind, from 3 credits for a Hashtag to 30 credits for an Advertiser. Tracking 10 creators daily for a month costs 1,800 credits ($1.80). Reading Change Reports is free. New accounts get 1,000 credits free, valid for 90 days. A Run that fails costs nothing, and a partial one is charged only for what finished.
Will I get a report every day?
No. A cycle that finds nothing over its thresholds writes no Change Report, so you only read about the days something moved.
Can I track a competitor's Ads?
Yes. An Advertiser Tracker reports new Ads, stopped Ads, extra variants and new countries or placements from the Meta Ad Library or the TikTok Ad Library. The TikTok Ad Library covers Ads shown in the EU/EEA, the UK, Switzerland and Turkey only.

Try it in your Assistant

Connect ShortsIntel to the Assistant you already use and ask the question this guide answers, or try the calls in the Playground first.

Connect ClaudeOpen the Playground