Instagram Follow Limit per Day: Don’t Sound the Alarms!

Have you ever gotten so excited to follow a bunch of Instagram pages that you go on a “follow” spree? Well, if you haven’t, good. It may sound innocent to follow tons of accounts online. However, there is a specific Instagram follow limit per day (and even per hour!). If you go above that daily limit, you can find yourself in trouble with the platform.

So, how many people can you follow until Instagram starts flagging you as suspicious for spam activities? What’s safe to do, and what isn’t? Today, we’re zeroing in on the limit of followers on Instagram and the repercussions of choosing to push this limit. Let’s break it down!

Is There Really an Instagram Follow Limit per Day?

Instagram might feel like an endless cornucopia of amazing, aesthetic pages to explore. But too much of anything is too much. So yes, there really is a limit on how many pages you can follow per day.

Various sources give different figures as to the limit for Instagram follows per day. The fact that Instagram doesn’t shed light on this arbitrary limit doesn’t help either. However, the general consensus online is that following 150-200 accounts within 24 hours is safe.

Of course, this may vary depending on the status of your account. If you have an established profile with a record of driving organic growth and activity, Instagram may be more lax. But if you have a brand-new account, they might keep a closer eye on your activity.

If you go beyond this limit, you may get an error message on the app. This message might tell you to wait a while before following more pages. This is Instagram’s effort to reduce spam users and automation tools on the platform.

How Many Accounts Can You Follow on Instagram per Hour?

While there’s no hard-set limit per hour, it might be smart to stick with following around 10 pages only. If you follow way too many pages in the span of an hour, Instagram might flag you as suspicious.

This number is low because Instagram keeps an eye on whether you follow many accounts in a short time. Following way too many pages might give off the vibe that you’re using automated behavior. Perhaps you paid a third-party automation tool to do the inauthentic follow-unfollow scheme to grow your page artificially. And that’s a huge no-no in Instagram’s books!

Think about it. A normal user might only come across one or two interesting pages they want to follow whenever they scroll online. What are the odds that in an hour, you see 20 or more pages you want to follow? That means you’re following a page every three minutes, which can look super sketchy.

So, try your best to spread out your follows across the hour. Don’t do it all at once. That way, Instagram won’t flag your account as having bot-like behavior.

Why Does It Keep Limiting Followers on Instagram?

Instagram limits your ability to follow more accounts if it senses spammy, bot-like behavior from your profile. The platform is known for the importance it places on authentic, meaningful engagement. So, it keeps an eye out for anything that looks like automated, ingenuine activity. Part of that is following a large number of pages in just a few minutes or hours.

When that happens, you’ll see an error message pop up on the screen. This message can say something along the lines of, “We limit how often you can do certain things on Instagram. That includes following people.”

You get the choice to contest this accusation if you want. But for the most part, Instagram is pretty accurate with flagging the speed at which users follow accounts. So, the solution is to just wait it out for a few hours or days before following more accounts. That usually does the trick, allowing you to follow more accounts without restrictions after a while.

If you keep going past the follow limits, it can lead to Instagram temporarily blocking you from the app. And we don’t mean just following people. Your won’t get to access your entire profile, too. That can throw a wrench in your content plan and engagement with fans. Yikes!

How Many People Can You Follow on Instagram in Total?

Aside from daily and hourly limits, Instagram also puts a cap on how many people you can follow in total. Every user on Instagram can only follow a maximum of 7,500 pages. If you try to follow more than that, you’ll see an error message telling you that you’ve reached the limit.

Instagram limits how many people you can follow to maintain content quality in your feed. If you follow too many pages, all of them will compete for a spot in your feed. That means you’ll end up missing out on the content of a lot of the pages you follow.

This limit is a good reason to be more purposeful and mindful of the pages you follow. You only have 7,500 spots to fill in your following list. So, it’s important to go for the ones you really love and publish relevant content that will enrich your life. It allows you to curate your feed better instead of filling it up with clutter from strangers and inactive accounts.

Do you know of a profile that is following more than 7,500 accounts? That’s because they’ve already followed that many pages even before the rules were implemented. These long-time accounts are the only exception to the rule.

What Is the Instagram Unfollow Limit per Day?

Most days, you’ll find pages you want to follow while you scroll through Instagram. But sometimes, you’ll realize that the ones you’re following don’t provide relevant, entertaining, engaging content like you had hoped. So, you might consider mass unfollowing a bunch of people. Is there a limit for that, too?

Yes, there are still some limits on how many people you can unfollow without getting flagged. It’s the same thing as following too many people in one go. Unfollowing too many accounts quickly still looks like you’re automating the behavior, which raises eyebrows.

Specifically, it may appear as though you’re using the follow-unfollow bot method to gain new followers. That’s the strategy of following people, waiting for them to follow back, then unfollowing them to boost your following-to-follower ratio. It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book, and Instagram looks out for it all the time.

To avoid causing issues and getting flagged for suspicious behavior, limit how many pages you unfollow per hour or day. We recommend doing it slowly, unfollowing 10-20 pages per day until you remove all the accounts you no longer like.

Is There an Instagram Follower Cap?

Thankfully, there’s no limit to how many Instagram followers you can have on your page. That’s why there are influencers and celebrities that have millions of fans. If you implement the right growth strategies and are super creative, you can attract as many fans as you want. That means there’s always room to grow on the platform!

That said, all accounts on Instagram can only follow 7,500 pages, no matter how popular they are. No exceptions.

Other Important Limits To Remember on Instagram

The IG follow limit isn’t the only limit you should keep in mind when trying to establish your Instagram presence. The platform also has a bunch of other limits and restrictions for everything from account creation to content. Here are just some of them to keep a mental note of:

• Age limit: Users must be 13 years old and above to create their own Instagram account. This is in line with COPPA, which prohibits social media sites from collecting data from kids below 13.
• Hashtag limit: It can be tempting to flood your captions with trending hashtags to boost your content’s visibility to your target audience. However, adding too many tags can make posts look spammy. That’s why Instagram limits tags to only 30 hashtags per post.
• Caption and bio length limits: Social media posts are supposed to be as bite-sized and easily digestible as possible. We’re not trying to write novels here, people! So, captions are limited to 2,200 characters only, while bios can only have 150 characters max.
• Word limit for direct messages: DMs were designed for quick chats and sharing awesome content with friends. They aren’t built for long-winded letters and chunky paragraphs. Keep in mind that DMs are limited to 1,000 characters only, including spaces.
• Likes and comments: Like following accounts, Instagram also flags users that like or comment on too many posts in a short time. This gives off automated like bot vibes. Try to limit your likes and comments to less than 100 per hour to avoid looking suspicious.
• Posts per day: Thankfully, there’s no set limit to how many posts you can publish each day on Instagram. As long as you have creative content to share, you can post away! It’s the silver lining to the many restrictions and limits on Instagram.

Enjoy Continuous Growth on IG by Staying Wary of the Follow Limits!

When you have a deep understanding of Instagram’s follow limits, you can dodge being flagged as a spam user. And when you avoid triggering the algorithm’s alarms, temporary blocks won’t hinder your online experience. That means you can keep your momentum going and sustain your page’s success.

Want to grow your page in another safe, sustainable way? Enlist the help of Path Social. We specialize in organic promotional strategies that align with Instagram’s community guidelines instead of going against them. More people see your content, which gets you real fans and genuine interactions on your page.

Plus, we don’t use any of those spammy follow-unfollow schemes. We hate those, and you can bet we’ll never use automation tools and bots to grow your page. So, you don’t have to worry about the Instagram follow limit per day getting in the way of your growth.

Thousands of influencers can vouch for our work, like Terrell Conyers, who gained 29,000 fans thanks to our strategies. Get a solid community of 100% real and engaged fans, just like she did with Path Social!

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