Key Takeaways

• If you can’t find the account of the person you suspect has blocked you, they might have changed their username, deactivated their account, or indeed blocked you.
• To confirm if their account hasn’t been deactivated or deleted, you can ask a mutual friend to check for their account. You can also use the unique profile link technique for this purpose.
• You can access their profile through an old DM to see if they have changed their username. If you’re unable to tag them or send a follow request, this confirms that you’ve been blocked.

Do you suspect that someone has blocked you on Instagram? Instagram does not allow you to see a list of people who have blocked you. In fact, the platform won’t even notify you when someone blocks you. There are, however, some methods you can use to find out if someone has blocked you on Instagram.

1 Search for Their Username

If you search for the profile of the person you suspect has blocked you but can’t locate it, there are four possible reasons: the person may have deactivated their account, Instagram may have banned their account, they might have changed their username, or they might indeed have blocked you.

To determine which of these possibilities applies to your situation, you need to rule them out one by one.

2 Ensure Their Account Is Still Active

If you can’t locate a person’s account through search, it’s worth checking whether the account in question still exists on Instagram or has been deactivated or removed. In the past, creating a new account to search for a profile was an option. However, Instagram now blocks any new account you create for that purpose, preventing you from verifying if you’ve been blocked.

Therefore, you should ask mutual friends to confirm if the person’s account still exists. If they’re unable to find it, the account has probably been deleted or temporarily deactivated rather than you being blocked. However, there’s a chance that the person has also blocked your mutual friends who are assisting you in checking the account.

To rule out this possibility, you can attempt to search for their account directly using a unique profile link.

3 Use the Instagram Unique Profile Link

When setting up your Instagram account, you’re assigned a unique URL that includes your username. Replacing the username in the profile link with the account handle of the person who you suspect has blocked you should take you to their account—if it exists.

If you open Instagram in your browser and search for their profile with a direct link, you’ll either see their profile directly, or the message: “Sorry, this page isn’t available.”

To confirm if the account exists or not, log out of Instagram and search the same URL in a new tab. You’ll see the same message if the account is deactivated (or no longer exists). If you see their profile this time, however, they have blocked you.

When someone changes their username, the URL name automatically changes too. So, if they have changed their username recently, the above methods won’t help you locate their profile.

4 Confirm They Haven’t Changed Their Username

If you’re unable to find your friend’s account through the search bar, and your friends are also facing the same issue, it’s important to confirm that the person hasn’t changed their username on Instagram.

When you are blocked, your previous conversations do not disappear. So, if you remember exchanging conversations via DM, open up your messages and go to their profile.

Since you can find out if someone has changed their username in this way, you’ll certainly have been blocked if their changed name doesn’t show up when looking for their account.

5 Make Sure They Haven’t Just Unfollowed You

When someone unfollows you on Instagram and has set their account to private, you won’t be able to view their photos and posts, and you’ll see a message stating, “This account is private.” Therefore, you should rule out the possibility that they’ve only unfollowed you. To confirm this, visit their profile and tap on the Follow button.

If they’ve unfollowed you, your follow request will be sent, and you’ll notice the Follow button changes to Requested. However, if they’ve blocked you, your follow request will be instantly canceled upon sending it, causing the Requested button to revert to Follow as soon as you tap on it.

6 Look Through Shared Instagram Group Chats

When someone blocks you on Instagram and they’re part of a group chat with you, Instagram gives them the option to leave the chat. If they decide to leave, you won’t receive any notifications about their departure, but you’ll find that their account is no longer visible in the group chat.

However, if they choose to remain in the group chat, you’ll still be able to see their profile and all the messages they send within the group chat. You can interact with their messages by replying or reacting to them.

If you notice that the person you suspect is actively participating in the group chat you share, but their profile displays “This account is private,” it suggests that they have either unfollowed you or blocked you.

Even if someone has blocked you on Instagram, you can still message them. However, they won’t receive these messages on their end. Therefore, if you can send messages to someone, don’t assume that you haven’t been blocked.

7 Mention and Tag the Account

When people block you on Instagram, you cannot mention or tag them in your posts or comments. That’s another way to find out if someone has blocked you. Nonetheless, making an account private has the same effect.

If you cannot tag or mention someone in a post on Instagram, search for their username or profile instead. If the account exists but you cannot see any posts, there is a good chance you have been blocked.

Instagram doesn’t notify you when someone blocks you on Instagram, but you can use some simple methods to check. If you discover that you were blocked by someone you’re close with, ask and see if they’ll unblock you.

If your relationship with someone is tarnished, or they refuse to unblock you, it’s important to respect their decision—whether you agree with it or not. Lastly, when someone blocks you on Instagram, the person gets automatically blocked from your side as well. So, you don’t need to retaliate and block them back.