I’ve got to admit, some of us just can’t help viewing stories of people we’re curious about. Do you have a frenemy? Then you probably know what I’m talking about!
The thing is, it may be embarrassing if that particular person found out you viewed their Instagram Story. After all, you wouldn’t want to be seen as a creepy stalker, or make things awkward when you have a complicated relationship.
But what if you block the person after viewing their Instagram story? Will that work and remove you from the viewer list?
If you view someone’s Instagram story and block them, they won’t know you saw it because your name won’t appear on the viewer list. However, you need to ensure you block them before they view their story viewer’s list.
To help you avoid such a seemingly embarrassing situation, we’ll walk you through what exactly happens after you view someone’s Instagram story and block them. Plus, we’ve included a complete list of methods to ensure you clean up your tracks.
How to Remove Your IG Name from the List of Users Who Viewed a Story
The solutions below should prove handy if you view someone’s Instagram story and want to block them. These methods will help you hide your identity so the poster can’t suspect you of stalking their account profile.
FIX 1. Change your username
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 3 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 10 seconds |
| Things Needed | Any smartphone A working internet connection |
After you view someone’s Instagram story and block them, we suggest changing your username for good measure. You can also use this as an alternative solution if you don’t want to block the story highlights’ poster.
However, conducting this name change after blocking the target is more reliable since it ensures they can’t know your identity. Of course, you must be quick when doing this, so the poster can’t see your username in their story highlights’ viewer list.
Otherwise, this method will be as pointless as blocking them if they already know who you are. Therefore, this method’s effectiveness rests on some luck and the ability to change your username as quickly as possible.
Step 1: Launch Instagram and log into your account. |
Step 2: Select your account’s profile icon in the bottom-right corner. |
Step 3: Click Edit Profile. |
Step 4: Select your Name and Username to change them. |
Step 5: Click Done to save your new name and username. |
FIX 2. Deactivate your account
| Difficulty | Easy ●●○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 14 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 1 minute and 10 seconds |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
By deactivating your account, you hide its presence from other users on the platform. Doing so will make your profile and posts inaccessible until you reactivate and make it accessible again.
Thus, it’s an excellent method for maintaining anonymity after viewing someone’s Instagram story and blocking them. Of course, you don’t need to block the poster if you’re going to deactivate your account.
After all, both methods will achieve the same results anyway, making it redundant to perform them in succession. We only recommend performing both methods to guarantee your identity remains anonymous or for your peace of mind.
Step 1: Launch Instagram and log into your account. |
Step 2: Select your account’s profile icon in the bottom-right corner. |
Step 3: Click the hamburger menu (three horizontal lines) in your profile page’s upper-right corner to see more options. |
Step 4: Go to your Settings and Privacy menu. |
Step 5: Tap on search. |
Step 6: Search for Deactivation or Deletion and select it from the text suggestions. Note: This method is more convenient because the Instagram menu layout changes depending on the app’s version. |
Step 7: Select your Instagram account. |
Step 8: Select the option for deactivating your Instagram account and click Continue. |
Step 9: Type your account’s password and click Continue. |
Step 10: Select a reason for deactivating your Instagram account and click Continue. |
Step 11: Scroll down and change the date for automatic account reactivation. |
Step 12: Choose the “Don’t reactivate automatically” option and tap Done. |
Step 13: Click Continue. |
Step 14: Click Deactivate Account. |
FIX 3. Wait twenty-four hours
| Difficulty | Easy ●●○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 1 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 24+ hours |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
Surprisingly, you don’t need to view someone’s Instagram story and block them to hide your identity. You can just wait twenty-four hours after the story highlights’ posting because it only lists the viewers during that period.
Beyond this twenty-four-hour window, anyone who watches won’t appear on the viewer list, so the poster won’t know if you watched their story highlight then.
However, this method requires as much luck and patience as you can provide. Remember that this will only work on Instagram Stories the user chooses to pin on their highlights!
Can someone still see if I viewed their story if I deactivate Instagram?
As mentioned, other Instagram users can’t access your account once you deactivate it, preventing them from seeing your username in their story’s viewer list. Sadly, this effect is temporary, as your username can appear once you reactivate your account.
Here are other ways for someone to know you watched their story highlights, even if you block them or deactivate your account afterward. It would be best to consider these factors so you don’t risk revealing your identity by accident.
- You took too long to block them: Blocking someone on Instagram is only effective if you do it before they can see your username in their story’s viewer list. Therefore, performing this as soon as possible is essential to its success.
- You block them as soon as they post it: Blocking someone immediately after they post a story highlight may appear suspicious. We suggest letting some time pass to reduce their likelihood of guessing your intentions.
- If you block an account you follow: Blocking someone you follow is tricky because they can tell once your account disappears from the chat or followers list. It’s especially true if it’s a person you’ve interacted with before.
How To Ensure They Can’t See If You’ve Watched Their Instagram Story
Now, let’s go deeper and add more security to our posts. Below are proven ways to ensure the other person can’t see whether or not you’ve watched their Instagram story highlights.
This way, you won’t worry about them thinking you’re stalking their account profile and watching their content for whatever reasons, malicious or not.
FIX 1. Enable Airplane mode
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 3 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 10 seconds |
| Things Needed | Any smartphone A working internet connection |
Enabling your device’s Airplane mode is the practical way to prevent the target profile’s owner from knowing you watched their Instagram story highlight.
In this method, you disconnect your phone from the Internet, so the platform can’t tell you’re viewing posts. It works because your Instagram app stores temporary data of the content it loads once you sign into your account.
This data is stored in the app’s cache storage and used to speed up your home feed’s load time since you don’t need to redownload the assets.
It’s how you can see photo and video posts on Instagram even when your internet connection cuts off. With this, even if you view someone’s story highlights, there’s no need to block them.
But it’s important to note that you must follow the poster of the story highlights so you can load their content on your home feed upon signing in. After your initial sign-in, follow our steps below to watch the target content while your device is in Airplane mode.
Step 1: Expand your smartphone’s notification bar by pulling it down. |
Step 2: Enable the Airplane mode switch. |
Step 3: Go to Instagram to watch the target story highlight without an internet connection. |
FIX 2. Half-swipe the story
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 5 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 30 seconds |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
Instead of viewing someone’s Instagram story and then blocking them, you can use a trick to access their post without alerting anyone. This involves half-swiping into the target’s story highlight so you can get a peek at its content without opening it.
As a result, even Instagram can’t tell that you watched the story highlight, ensuring that your username doesn’t appear in the viewer list. Unfortunately, this method isn’t reliable for watching video story highlights since it can’t play their content.
Since you’re not opening the target’s story highlights, all you can see is a static image of its initial part. Thus, we only recommend using this method on image-only story highlights because you don’t need to play them to see their content.
Additionally, you can only use this trick on story highlights accessible from your Instagram home feed. Therefore, you must follow the target profile beforehand to load their story highlights on your account.
| Step 1: Launch Instagram and log into your account. |
Step 2: Go to your account’s home feed and find your target story highlight. |
Step 3: Open the story highlight before or after your chosen target. |
Step 4: Swipe slowly to transition to your target story highlight. Note: Swipe to the left if you open the story highlight before the target, and swipe to the right if you’re on the one after it. |
Step 5: Hold your smartphone screen halfway into the target story highlight to view its content. |
FIX 3. Block the poster
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 4 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 20 seconds |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
If you don’t have a problem with viewing someone’s Instagram story and blocking them after, then we suggest doing it. After all, it’s the most straightforward way to stop them from knowing you watched their story highlights.
Since blocking an account prevents interactions between two parties, doing so will hide your activities in the platform. Consequently, the poster won’t see your Instagram username appear on their story highlights’ viewer list.
However, they might notice that you blocked them if you had previous interactions and suddenly stopped appearing in their account. Thus, they can suspect you blocked their account and deduce your intention to hide something from them.
Step 1: Click the poster’s Instagram profile or username in the upper-left corner of their story highlight. |
Step 2: Click the meatballs menu (three horizontal dots) in their profile page’s upper-right corner to see more options. Note: Depending on your Instagram app’s version, you might see a kebab menu (three vertical dots) instead. |
Step 3: Click Block on the pop-up menu. |
Step 4: Click Block again to confirm this action. |
FIX 4. Deactivate your account
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 1 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 1 minute and 10 seconds |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
Deactivating your Instagram account works like blocking someone because it hides your activities, posts, and presence from them. However, you can’t use your account until you reactivate it automatically or manually.
As such, you can use this method to prevent someone from knowing you viewed their Instagram story instead of blocking them. Since we have already tackled this method, follow our previous instructions for deactivating your account.
FIX 5. Watch the story using a burner account
| Difficulty | Very Easy ●○○○○ |
| Number of Steps | 5 |
| Time to Perform Fix | 30 seconds |
| Things Needed | A PC or smartphone A working internet connection |
Using a burner account is a popular way to watch other people’s profiles and content without revealing your identity. Therefore, you can view someone’s Instagram story without blocking them afterward since they can’t tell it was you.
However, the caveat is you must follow the target using your burner account on Instagram. Otherwise, you can’t access their story highlights unless their account and posts are public.
Private Instagram accounts are tricky because the target must approve your request to follow them. If you’re using an unidentifiable burner account, the chances of approval are usually slim.
| Step 1: Launch Instagram and log into your account. |
| Step 2: Select your account’s profile icon in the bottom-right corner. |
Step 3: Click your username. |
Step 4: Select a burner account. |
Step 5: Click the lens icon at the bottom to search for the Instagram profile with the story highlight you want to watch. |
