Social media platforms like Instagram were created to provide features used for entertainment and communication over the Internet. But as the world evolves and innovations in technology are constant, it is essential to keep our personal information safe. If you’ve been using Instagram, one way to keep it safe is to set your Instagram account to private.

After creating an account on Instagram, it is set as public by default. That means that everyone can see your posts and profile on Instagram. Changing your Instagram account to private will only allow those who followed you to access your Instagram posts and profile.

If you’re fond of using hashtags, making your account private will also affect this feature. Hashtags that you’ve posted on a private account will only appear to your approved followers or in Instagram DM’s (Direct Messages). If you will set your Instagram to private, likes and comments are only viewable by your approved followers.

If you would like to set your Instagram account private, follow the steps that I’ve provided below.

Change your Instagram Account from Public to Private

Time Needed : 05 minutes

Here are the steps to set your Instagram account to private:

Open your Instagram app and go to Profile.
You can access your Profile by tapping on the profile icon at the bottom right corner.
Access Menu options.
It is the 3 lines at the top right.
Tap on Settings.
You can find it in the lower part of the screen.
Tap on Privacy.
This will open your Privacy settings.
Select Account Privacy.
You can find it under Connections.
Toggle the switch beside Private Account.
This will activate and set your Instagram account to Private.

Tools

Instagram app

Materials

iPhone

Aside from the app, you can also set your Instagram account from public to private accessing instagram.com on a computer or mobile browser. Just access your Profile, go to Settings by clicking on the gear icon. Then access Privacy and Security > Account Privacy and tick the box next to Private Account.

Just be reminded that once you’ve set your Instagram account to private, there are still some details that can be viewed by the public. One good example is a private post that you share to other social networks like Facebook may still be viewable by the public depending on your privacy settings from the site.

After making your account on Instagram private, those who would like to connect with you and see your posts, following lists or followers will need to send a follow request. You can see this follow requests on Activity and that’s where you can accept or ignore them.

For any reason that you don’t want some followers to see your posts after setting your account to private, you can block them as well. Even when your account is private, people that are not following you can still send a photo or videos directly to you.

I hope that this article provided some essential information and helped you change your Instagram account to private. If you’ll need more knowledge about tutorials or troubleshooting, you can also watch some videos on our Youtube channel. Feel free to like the videos and don’t forget to subscribe. Thank you.