If you’ve ever wanted to block someone from following you on Instagram without causing social media drama, you might soon be able to do just that. Instagram confirmed it’s testing a new feature that will allow users with public accounts to remove followers, the Verge reports.
The feature doesn’t notify followers when you remove them, giving you more power over who can see you account even if it’s public while (hopefully) letting you avoid the extreme measure of a block.
Until recently, Instagram only let private users delete followers, but in recent months, public users, mostly on Android, have seen the feature pop up on their apps.
Instagram now lets you manually remove followers!?!
— Matt Navarra (I quit X. Follow me on Threads) (@MattNavarra) July 17, 2018
h/t @blueasyraff pic.twitter.com/McIXETlR7I
https://twitter.com/cherrialani/status/1006305911562895360
i love how instagram lets you remove followers now because blocking is so fucking immature lmaoo
— ev 🍓 (@yungeveliitt) June 11, 2017
The old-fashioned version of this feature was “soft-blocking,” that is, blocking someone and then unblocking them in order to stop them from following your account. But this comes with the risk of someone potentially finding out that you blocked them if you don’t unblock quick enough.
Another passive approach is the newly implemented mute function, which allows you to mute posts and stories from people you want to keep following but whose content you don’t want to see.
From favorite followers to chronological timelines, Instagram users will always have new requests. Although it’s unknown if and when the platform will roll out the “remove followers” option for everyone, testing of the feature indicates Instagram is taking note of users’ wishlists.
READ MORE:
- Can you tell if someone is looking at your Instagram?
- Here are the best times to post on Instagram
- How to tell if someone blocked you on Instagram
H/T the Verge