The sidebar starts minimised while you are in the composer so the screen has room. If you have no channel that is ready to publish, the composer shows No channels ready yet and a Connect a channel button. See Connect channels.
The screen
The composer has three areas:
On a narrow screen these become three tabs at the top: Write, Assets and Preview.
The header shows Unsaved changes, Draft saved automatically at a time, or Saved with a time. A ring in the header counts four steps that must be satisfied before a post is ready: Channels, Content, Limits and Rules.
Write a post
1
Choose channels
In the Publish to card, select Choose channels (it reads Change channels once some are selected). Search by channel or network name, narrow the list with All or Selected, then tick channels. Under Sets you can select a whole channel group, or every channel of one network with an entry such as Every LinkedIn channel. Use Select all and Deselect all for bulk changes, and Done to close.Only channels that are active, on a network your administrator has switched on, and included in your plan can be picked.
2
Write the caption
Type in the main caption box under the All channels tab. This text goes to every channel unless you give a channel its own caption. A counter under the box shows Words, Characters, Mentions and Links, and the number of characters against the shortest limit among the selected channels.
3
Adjust per channel
Select a channel’s tab above the caption box to see Caption for that channel and its settings. See Customise each channel.
4
Attach media
Pick files from the Assets panel, drop files into the composer, or choose Upload. See Attach media.
5
Add a first comment, link and labels
Fill in First comment and link and Labels as needed. See First comment, link and labels.
6
Choose when it goes out
Open the When tab. See Scheduling.
7
Check and send
Open Checks, fix any issue, then use Save draft, Schedule or Publish now at the bottom of the screen.
Caption tools
The toolbar of the caption box offers:- Insert emoji, with a search box.
- Saved, a panel of your Captions and Hashtags from the library. A saved caption is inserted at the cursor. A hashtag group is added to the end of the caption. Select Manage library to open the library. See Saved captions and brand voice.
- Write with AI, which opens the writing assistant. See AI writing and media.
How length is counted
Each network counts characters its own way, and the counter follows it. X counts every link as 23 characters whatever its length, and counts an emoji as 2. Threads counts one per character, except that an emoji costs its UTF-8 byte length, so a single heart can use four of the 500. Other networks count characters. A network that accepts a shorter caption under media than text alone, such as WhatsApp and Telegram, applies the shorter limit once media is attached. For X, an account whose subscription allows long posts, detected when you connect it, can write up to 25,000 characters. Otherwise the limit is 280.Caption limits by network
These are the limits MagicPost enforces. They are the same limits the Checks tab uses.
A first comment on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Threads also needs the commenting permission on the connection. If a connection never received it, the composer treats the network as not supporting first comments for that channel. Reconnect the channel to grant it. A Telegram channel has no permission to grant. It takes a first comment once the bot is an admin of the channel’s discussion group, see Telegram channels.
Media limits, formats and post-type options are on each network’s page. See Publishing channels.
Customise each channel
Select a channel’s tab above the caption box. A dot on the tab shows that the channel has its own caption. A warning icon with Needs a fix shows a problem.- Start from the shared caption copies the main caption into this channel’s box. Copy shared and Use shared do the same from the toolbar.
- Leave the box empty to use the shared caption. The placeholder reads Leave blank to use the shared caption.
- A Settings for card appears when the network has options for the post. It can include a Post type selector (for example Feed post, Reel or Story on Facebook), network-specific options marked with
*when required, and notes about the network. An option shows only where it applies, such as Forum topic for a Telegram group that has topics. - A First comment for box lets one channel have its own first comment.
When a network’s developer app is still in sandbox mode, the settings card says what goes out there is visible only to the account that posted it.
Attach media
Click a file in the Assets panel to attach it. A numbered badge shows its position. Click again to detach. You can also:- Select Upload, or drag files from your computer onto the composer. Dropped files are added to your library and attached when they are ready.
- Use the Create a picture with AI button to make one. See AI writing and media.
- Use Browse the full library to open the full picker.
- Filter the panel by file type or folder, or search by file name.
Alt text and crop
Choose Alt text and crop on an attached file to open its panel.- Alt text describes the picture for people who cannot see it. It saves with the file, so every later post that uses the file gets the same words. The limit is 1,000 characters. Select Save alt text. For pictures, Suggest alt text asks the AI writing model for a suggestion. See AI writing and media.
- Under How each channel gets it, choose a Shape for each channel that takes images. Original sends the file as it is, padded only where a network would refuse its shape. The other shapes are crops the network accepts, from 1:1, 4:5, 2:3, 9:16, 16:9 and 1.91:1.
- Click the part of the picture that matters to set the focal point. Every crop keeps that part in frame.
- Edit with AI opens the media studio with this picture as the source.
First comment, link and labels
- First comment is posted as a reply right after the post goes out. A channel shows first comment in the Checks tab when its network, post type and connection allow it. Where they do not, no comment is attempted. A connection that was never granted the commenting permission cannot post one, so reconnect it. On YouTube, no comment is posted when Made for kids is on.
- Link is shown as a link card where the network supports one. On LinkedIn the card is read from the page when the post goes out. Telegram does not use this field, so put the address in the text.
- Labels are short tags for finding posts later in the Posts list and the Calendar. Type a label and press Enter or comma. You can add up to 10 labels of up to 30 characters. A leading
#is removed and repeated labels are ignored.
Preview, When and Checks
The right panel has three tabs.- Preview
- When
- Checks
Shows how the post will look on a channel. One shows the selected channel, and All shows every selected channel. The preview updates as you type. Pick a channel first, or you see Pick a channel to see how the post will look.
Save, schedule or publish
The bar at the bottom shows Delivery, which summarises the chosen timing, the number of selected channels and files, and the issue count.
Publish now opens a Publish now? window that lists the channels. A published post cannot be unpublished from here, so choose Publish now only when you are ready, or Not yet to go back.
A post can be edited while it is a draft, awaiting approval, scheduled, paused or failed.
Team approval
If you are a member of a team whose owner turned on sign-off, and the team’s plan includes the approval workflow, the button labels change and nothing goes out until a reviewer approves:- Schedule becomes Send for approval.
- Publish now becomes Publish after approval, and the confirmation reads Send for approval and publish?
Drafts and autosave
While a draft has unsaved changes and at least one channel is selected, the composer saves it automatically every 30 seconds. Autosave only touches new posts and drafts. It never puts a post on the schedule or takes one off. The header then reads Draft saved automatically at the time. Leaving the page with unsaved changes asks you to confirm. New post in the header clears the composer. Start a new post? Changes that are not saved will be lost. confirms it first.Limits that can stop a save
- Your plan sets how many posts you can create each month. When it is used up, you see Your plan covers N posts a month and you have used them all. Upgrade to keep posting. Editing a post that already counted is still possible.
- Your plan also sets how many posts can wait on the schedule. When it is full, you see Your plan holds N posts in the schedule at a time. Publish or remove one to make room.
- A time in the past is refused with That time has already passed. Pick a time in the future.
- A post that selects a channel on a network your plan excludes is refused as a whole.
Keyboard shortcuts
Press? in the composer to see the list.