AFAIK, some instances have a way to view popular posts on the "/explore" page. The instance I just migrated from had it, but the one I am on now doesn't, so it isn't all of them.

There is someone who has been keeping a fork of it alive: https://github.com/uazo/bromite-buildtools

I like pixelfed. I have a pixelfed account, and feature-wise, I see how it could replace someone's use of instagram, but personally, I was never on instagram for its features. I was on instagram because I made friends in real life who I couldn't keep in touch with in absolutely any other way. Meanwhile, I am on pixelfed because I like the idea of a federated social media platform based around images, but I have zero connections on that platform.

I posted to it twice. Then, I realized that, unless I could convince the people that I knew on instagram to join pixelfed, it would never be the same experience, so I stopped. I would just rather post pictures to my mastodon account which has more reach than my pixelfed. The concept of an image based social media platform is less compelling when you don't know anyone there, and this is what Meta is banking on.

Sure, there are alternatives to Instagram that are better, but all of my IRL friends & family are on Meta platforms already and don't want to leave 🤷‍♀️, so what's the point? Even if I manage to convince someone that it is important, they might bail at some point because they can't convince the people they know from instagram to join the alternative, and that's how it is all down the line: friction, friction, friction.