How Many People Can I Unfollow On Instagram? (Explained)

Are you tired of unnecessary content on your Instagram feed?

You may want to unfollow people on Instagram that are not relevant to you (for example, you followed them only to win freebies).

You might also want to unfollow people who post spam content or stuff that you are not interested in.

In the early days of Instagram, users were not restricted from unfollowing any accounts.

However, with the latest advancements and enhanced security features, users cannot unfollow a quantity of Instagram accounts at once.

There are, in fact, policies in place, and all users are required to follow the rules.

Let us discuss the exact number of users you can unfollow without getting in any trouble and the factors that decide the number of allowed unfollowed actions.

How Many People Can I Unfollow On Instagram?

Typically, you are allowed to unfollow a maximum of 200 users in a day if you have a relatively older account.

However, the number goes down to fewer than 100 users per day if you have a new account.

Unfortunately, the numbers are not as simple as they seem.

Although you can unfollow 200 users in a day, continuous unfollowing for hours may also result in some trouble.

Here are some unfollowing limitations that you need to keep in mind.

Allowed number of unfollows for the first week: 51 per day
Allowed number of unfollows for the second week: 100 per day
Allowed number of unfollows for the third week: 150 per day
Allowed number of unfollows for the fourth week: 200 per day

In short, the maximum number of accounts you can unfollow in a day amounts to 200.

If your account is older than four weeks, you can still face certain restrictions every time you exceed the limit of 200.

However, the limit may vary slightly based on some critical factors, as discussed below.

5 Factors That Decide The Unfollowing Limit For Your Account

Like other social platforms, Instagram gives a slight edge and benefit to its trusted users, but it is still hard to determine which users it actually considers to be trustable.

Our research found that accounts with the below-mentioned features get some leniency on different terms of use, especially the unfollow limit.

1. Account Activity

Account activity is one of the crucial factors to ensure trustworthiness on the platform.

You need to be an active user to be considered reliable for Instagram.

Your account’s past activities also play a significant role in developing trust.

Your account should be free from any suspicious activities and must not have faced any temporary bans.

Any previous ban or warning might result in a downgraded status on your profile, and you won’t be able to utilize the perks of being a trustable user.

You should avoid any such activity that might be the reason for any ban.

As long as you keep utilizing the platform manually and within the recommended terms of use, you will be provided certain benefits over others.

2. Number Of Followers

The number of active followers is another crucial factor in getting Instagram benefits.

The more followers you have, the better you are in the eyes of Instagram.

However, the followers must be active Instagram users.

Most people purchase Instagram followers and think they have become trustable Instagram influencers, which is not true.

Instagram’s algorithm is smart enough to catch any such activity and impose bans instead of upgrading the profile.

Although these purchases work fine to gain people’s trust, good content and user interaction are still the deciding factors for gaining natural followers.

3. User’s Engagement

Instagram generally pushes posts and stories that gain maximum user engagement in Instagram’s search bar for the relevant audience.

However, this is not the only benefit these accounts get, you may also see them getting featured in different search results and they may also appear in your suggested followers.

The number of likes and comments are the major deciding factors for user engagement on Instagram.

However, Instagram also considers some core features to finalize the user engagement score.

These core features include the time spent by a user on any post, the number of DMs received, story shares, etc.

If your account is getting good user engagement, you can expect certain benefits from Instagram, but you still need to remain within the limits of Instagram’s Terms of Service (TOS) and must not violate any of their significant terms.

4. Account’s Age

Your account’s age is one of the most important factors for gaining trust and increasing the maximum unfollow limit.

It does not matter how much engagement you are getting or how many followers you have.

If your account is not old enough, you already fail to qualify for the additional perks.

In its TOS, Instagram mentions that any active accounts on the platform who are there for more than three months will be considered old accounts.

Any such account that does not meet the requirements is still relatively new and must avoid any wrong activities at any cost.

5. Type Of Account

Your account type is another important factor that plays an essential role in gaining trust on Instagram.

A business account with no privacy feature enabled generally gets more exposure than personal accounts.

Instagram offers personal, creator, and business accounts, and they are meant to serve different purposes.

Typically, personal accounts are used for individual purposes.

Influencers, on the other hand, use creator accounts, and business accounts are for business-related activities.

According to our research, creator and business accounts have slight advantages over personal or individual accounts.

For this reason, we highly recommend you create accounts that fall in either of those two categories.

However, if you have signed up on Instagram for personal entertainment and are concerned for your privacy, you have no option but to use individual accounts.

Alternatives To The Unfollowing Feature

Although Instagram restricts users from following or unfollowing too many users at a time, it does offer some alternatives.

These can be extremely handy for tackling any excess followers situation on Instagram.

1. Blocking A User

Blocking is an excellent option if you face a significant issue with someone’s account and desire to unfollow them, but you can’t because of some type of restriction.

However, blocking is entirely different from unfollowing but can be utilized in the worst-case scenarios.

Once you block an account, all of your connections with that account will be removed, and neither of you will be able to like, comment, or follow each other.

Instagram will also remove all the previous activities from that that blocked account on your account.

2. Restricting A User

Restricting any user is another excellent option for people who cannot unfollow more than a certain number of accounts.

The restrict feature is slightly different from unfollowing feature since the person will remain in your following list, but you won’t see any of their activities in your feed.

Restricted accounts are also blocked from commenting or liking your posts.

The person might not even realize they were restricted, which saves you from giving them any sort of explanation!

3. Mute A User

Muting someone’s account is like blocking any sort of action from that profile.

If you mute someone on Instagram, you won’t be able to see any of their actions.

This includes all their stories, posts, comments, and likes.

The mute option is considered the best alternative to unfollowing since the muted accounts won’t appear on your profile even if you are following them.

Why Does Instagram Restrict People From Unfollowing?

Instagram is a social platform on which people from different races, colors, and religions hang out and make friends.

Because of this, the platform must take all the safety measures to make sure the platforms remain clean.

Instagram is a community of eight-plus billion users with many people posting, following, commenting, liking, etc.

Most people utilize this platform for chatting and calling as well.

Hence, to ensure only quality content circulates among the Instagram community, the company restricts any mass activities, such as excessive unfollowing.

What Happens When We Unfollow Too Many Accounts on Instagram?

You might face a temporary ban from accessing certain features if you keep unfollowing people manually.

However, this temporary ban might also result in a permanent ban if you keep utilizing third-party software for unfollowing people.

You will know when you have reached the maximum unfollowing limit when you won’t be able to unfollow any more accounts.

The unfollow option just won’t work.

However, if your account faces a permanent or temporary ban, you will see a popup indicating access denied, or you might even have trouble logging in.

How Long Do Instagram’s Unfollow Restrictions Last?

The period mostly depends on account history.

In most cases, once you have faced the unfollow restrictions, it might last for 24 to 72 hours.

The imposed ban is removed within 72 hours most of the time.

However, if it is not, you should contact the support and discuss your issue.

The easiest way for contacting support is through the main menu help center feature.

Can We Bypass Instagram’s Unfollow Limitations?

Yes, you can bypass Instagram’s unfollow limits but only to a small extent.

You need to be smart enough while taking necessary actions or utilizing any third-party software.

Here are the three significant ways you can bypass Instagram’s unfollow restrictions.

1. Unfollow People At Different Time Intervals

One of the best ways to bypass the unfollow limitations is by unfollowing accounts at different time intervals.

You can opt to take a break for an hour or two before continuing the unfollowing process.

This will give the application an indication that the activity is from a human and not a robot, so it will let you exceed the daily unfollow limit.

2. Use Third-Party Applications Smartly

Third-party contracts can be beneficial if they are used with a sense of ownership.

However, if you fail to do so and leave any loopholes, your account can face suspension.

These third-party applications also enable an auto-follow/unfollow feature with a regular time interval.

You can set the timing according to the limits we mentioned at the beginning of this article, and wait for the application to bulk remove your Instagram following.

Although third-party software can be beneficial, it can cause different issues such as data loss.

Therefore, it is highly recommended to use trusted software that has good reviews on the app store.

3. Use The Application Smartly

Smart usage of the platform can benefit you in many different ways.

If you can make sure that your use of the application is entirely natural, Instagram will allow you to remove more followers than the present limit.

To make your actions look natural, you need to dig deep into the profiles of others and unfollow people with whom you interact the least.

This will let Instagram’s algorithm believe that the account owner is willing to remove different accounts that are primarily inactive or does not benefit the owner.

While doing this, you can easily remove some of the accounts that you interact with as well.

This can be a great Instagram hack for unfollowing people that most people might not have discovered.

4 Other Instagram Limitations

Unfollow restrictions are not the only limits that Instagram has imposed on users.

To keep the platform clean, Instagram also limits the number of likes, comments, hashtags, stories, and any other activities that represent abnormal behavior.

1. Likes

On average, you are allowed to like a maximum of 300 to 500 posts in a day.

However, if you exceed the limit, you might face restrictions for liking other pictures.

Before these restrictions, most Instagram influencers used to utilize different third-party software to gain maximum likes with the help of bots.

Due to this, Instagram imposed this limit to ensure proper usage of the platform.

The decision turned out to be quite useful!

2. Comments

Typically, you are allowed to make 200 comments in a day.

These comments can be made at any time of the day and on any post.

Instagram, like most social media platforms, promotes posts that have maximum comments.

Most spammers would utilize this feature to boost their posts by generating irrelevant comments on their Instagram posts.

Such activities turned out to be the major reason for this restriction.

3. Hashtags

Hashtags are one of the most potent tools for following the latest trends on Instagram.

However, Instagram does not allow people to use more than 30 hashtags in a single post.

This restriction has limited most users from using irrelevant hashtags on their posts.

Instagram’s algorithm has also become smart enough to push posts that have relevant hashtags.

Instagram users who utilize irrelevant hashtags to gain more exposure will not be able to benefit anymore.

4. Direct Messages

Stopping spam messages has always been the topmost priority of Instagram over the past few years.

After the recent updates, Instagram has clearly indicated that people sending more than 40 DMs will be marked as spammers and might face consequences.

Spamming DMs is one of the major scenarios that Instagram keeps a close eye on and never hesitates to take serious actions.

If your DMs are reported as messages responsible for harassment or cyberbullying, you might also face a legal suit.

To prevent any worst consequences, you should avoid spamming DMs of other people.