How to see a private instagram account 2019

How to View a Private Instagram Account in 2022

The best way to view a private Instagram account is by requesting to follow it.
If you Google search the private Instagram account, you may be able to view associated images.
You can also go through a friend's account if they follow the account you want to view.

Instagram gives us a sneak peek into the lives of other people. But since you can make an account private, you won't always have access to the photos and videos some people post, especially if you don't opt to follow those private accounts.

Sometimes, this can make sense: You may be wary of following an account without being able to see what they're posting. So it can help to look for examples of their posts to decide if you want to follow an account or not.

Here's what you need to know about seeing a private Instagram's posts:

How to view a private Instagram account

If you want to view a private Instagram account at any time, your best bet is to just follow the account. This requires the user to approve your follow request.

There are some alternative methods you can use to view a private Instagram account without following the account, including using third-party apps that violate Instagram's terms of use — which we don't recommend doing.

That said, there are other ways you could technically and ethically view a private Instagram account (or posts associated with the account) without following the account directly.

How to view a private Instagram account without requesting to follow it

If you aren't already following the private account, here are two methods you can try:

Do a Google image search for the account name

You can copy and paste the private account's Instagram name (you can view the name, post count, and follower and following figures even of a private account) into Google and then do an image search.

You can still see a private account’s name, post count and follower/following figures.

Devon Delfino

Chances are that some of their pictures will come up, having been tagged elsewhere on a public Instagram or even Facebook accounts.

A Google image search can sometimes show select photos from a private Instagram account. Devon Delfino

Quick tip: It may help to add "Instagram" to your search query if you're not seeing anything pop up when searching the handle on Google images.

Go through someone else's account

If you know someone who follows the private Instagram you want to view, you could always access that account through their account – with your friend or acquaintance's permission, of course.

If there's a specific Instagram post you want to see, you could also ask them to take a screenshot of the private post and send it to you.

Otherwise, you could request to follow a private Instagram account from another account you've created.

Devon Delfino

Devon Delfino is a Brooklyn-based freelance journalist specializing in personal finance, culture, politics, and identity. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Los Angeles Times, Teen Vogue, Business Insider, and CNBC. Follow her on Twitter at @devondelfino.

Is There A Way to View Private Instagram Accounts?

With more than one billion active users per month, Instagram has become the most popular social media platform for sharing visual content, whether to stay connected with family and friends or to reach out to and engage with other users with similar interests or a target market for one’s brand. Most personal accounts are, of course, kept private; Instagram accounts of celebrities, influencers, and businesses are normally available for public viewing. Whatever their default privacy settings, users always have the option to customize who can view specific posts and information.

One of the frequently asked questions about Instagram is, “Is it possible to view a private Instagram account?” Keep reading to find out.

Table of Contents

What is a Private Instagram Profile?

Private mode is an option available exclusively to personal accounts, whether you’re a regular Jane/Joe or a well-known personality. When you set your profile to private mode, only your followers can view, like, and comment on your posts and you have control over who follows your account as you can confirm or reject follow requests. You also have the option to switch to public mode so that anybody on Instagram can view your posts and follow you freely.

Business accounts, however, are always public. This means any Instagram user can follow you and see, like, and comment on your posts. If you wish to make your account private, you will first have to switch it back to a personal account.

Unlike Facebook, Instagram’s private or public mode only applies to the account itself. If you have a private profile, you can’t set the visibility of specific posts to public; and if you have a public profile, you can’t make the visibility of select posts private.

You should carefully consider the pros and cons before making the decision to set your personal profile to private or public mode. How seriously do you take your privacy? What’s the purpose of your Instagram account? Do you care if total strangers or people you barely know follow you and see and/or react to your posts?

You can easily switch between the two modes any time you want to, however. You can give each one a try to see what works best for you.

Is There a Legitimate Way to View Private Instagram Profiles?

Obviously, you can view a private IG profile and their posts by becoming a follower — given, of course, that your follow request is approved. Following a private account is the only legitimate way to view and interact with their posts. Whether or not they confirm your follow request will depend on how well they know you and how much they value their privacy.

If they only consider you a casual acquaintance, they may grant you access if they’re not too cautious about guarding their privacy. If you’re a complete stranger and the person prefers to limit their circle to only family and friends, however, it’s very likely that your follow request won’t be confirmed and you won’t have any way of viewing their private posts.

Some celebrities, for example, create one account for public consumption and another just for people they personally know. If you’re a fan, you may only be able to follow them via their public profile. If you’re keen on learning more about their private life, you may have to find other ways to take a peek because their private Instagram profile will be off-limits to the public.

What are Other Methods to View Private Instagram Accounts?

Online stalking may be pervasive in this day and age of social media, but it’s not always proper behavior. Famous personalities, of course, understand that invasion of their privacy is part of the package. Nevertheless, getting access to their private accounts by going through creative and deceptive means is still not acceptable. This is even more true for the private accounts of average individuals.

With that said, there are ways to get a glimpse of a private Instagram account. We don’t recommend that you try them because you’ll run the risk of getting reported and blocked. Different solutions to this privacy obstacle are easily searchable on Google, of course. Here are the most common tricks.

Create a New Identity for a Temporary IG Account

This method may only work if you know that the person you want to follow won’t approve your follow request using your own account. If the person in question is extremely cautious about who they allow to view their private profile, creating a fake IG account may not be an effective means to gain access.

Create a Duplicate Account

This involves impersonating another IG user and can get you into serious trouble. Nevertheless, countless individuals engage in this practice, and some do it to gain access to another person’s private profile.

How do they do it? First, they have to do some research on all social media platforms to find some of the activities of the person they’re interested in. These are likes and comments they make on other people’s posts, or even photos they may be tagged in that are public.

Second, they identify the likely candidates for impersonation. These are people that the person of interest interacts with the most. They settle on a candidate and then save a photo of the person to their phone/computer. They use this photo to create the duplicate account; they also create a believable bio using the same info from the original to make the duplicate account as believable as possible. Once the duplicate profile is complete, they can now use it to send a follow request to their person of interest.

Sometimes, this trick works; but the illusion doesn’t last. Sooner or later, the duplicate account is exposed and, more often than not, blocked and reported. Between the time when the follow request is approved and when the fake account is discovered, the faker would have already gotten a good look at their person of interest’s profile and posts.

If the said person is a shrewd sort, they may spot the fake account right away and the faker’s mission would be a failure. Again, they may be reported to Instagram and will most likely be blocked by their target.

Perform a Google Search

If your target profile used to have a public account, then you may be able to find it on Google. Public Instagram posts are indexed by Google, so when you do a Google search, you may find some of these old, public posts. You may do a Google search using your target’s current username and/or their real name.

Perform a Search on Other Social Media Platforms

More often than not, Instagram users also have accounts on other social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok. If you’re unable to find your target on IG, you can look for their other social media accounts where they will most likely share the link to their IG profile. Of course, there’s always the chance that their other social media profiles will also be restricted. But this method is worth a try as you may also be able to view some of their posts on other platforms — and, needless to say, this is not borderline unethical.

Take a Peek Via a Friend’s Account

If you and your target have mutual friends and these friends are already following your target, or if you know someone who’s a follower, you could try to ask this person if they would let you view your target’s profile using their account. If you and this individual have a close enough relationship, you could also ask them to send you photos and screenshots of posts.

Use Third-Party Apps

There are a lot of third-party apps that offer “private profile viewer tools” for Instagram. You should be wary of these apps as most of them do not work as advertised and are actually designed to infect devices with malware or ransomware; others may just take your money, if you’re lucky, or also steal your personal data. Here are some of the most popular of these apps.

IGLookup.com

Also known as Instagram Grammies, this app is the most widely used private profile viewer on IG. To access a private IG profile, you simply go to the IGLookup website, click on the “Spy now” button, and then enter the username of your target. The process usually takes a bit of time before the private posts of your target are displayed for your perusal.

PrivateInsta

This app is compatible with Andoid, iOS, Windows, as well as OSX. The app doesn’t require a user to sign in to their account to be able to view a private profile; however, you will have to complete a survey first. Once you’ve completed the survey, all you have to do is enter the username of your target on the app’s website and then hit submit.

InstaLooker

The app doesn’t require a download. Just go directly to their website, click on “Spy now,” enter your target’s username, and then hit “Start Viewer. ” The app also offers an export option that allows you to download your target’s photos and videos.

InstaRipper

You will first have to download the app; it’s compatible with Android, iOS, Mac OS, and Windows. And then you will be asked to enter your target’s username. You will be provided with a link from which you’ll be able to view your target’s private profile.

InstaDPS

This app works differently than other private profile viewer apps. It will ask you to copy your target’s Instagram username and paste it into the input text box. Next, you’ll click on the “Download” button. An image of your target’s profile will appear; right-click on it to save it to your device. And then you’ll be able to view it any time you want.

Private Instagram Viewer

Similar to the other apps, you will have to visit the app’s website and provide your target’s username. You will be asked to verify if the profile it comes up with is correct; once you’ve confirmed it, you’ll be able to view your target’s account without them knowing about it.

WatchInsta

You won’t need to log in to your own Instagram account to use the app. Just visit the website and provide your target’s username. Choose the type of content you want to view: photos, videos, text files, or all of them. Click “View Profile.” You also have the option to export any or all of the files in .zip format.

Insta-downloader.net

This app only allows you to download your target’s profile photo. You simply have to go to the app’s website, paste the profile photo’s link into the download box, and then click on “Download Photo.”

How Can You Make Your Profile Private?

If you value your privacy and wish to restrict access to your profile, set your account’s visibility to private. There will always be people out there who might still find a way to get past your privacy settings, i.e., they might try one or all of the methods mentioned above, so be extra careful before approving new follow requests.

To switch your account to private, just follow these steps:

Launch your Instagram app.
Tap on “Settings,” which is located at the bottom right corner of the screen.
From the account setting options, tap on the “Privacy” button.
The privacy settings will be displayed; tap on “Connections” and then “Account Privacy.”
You’ll see the Public/Private option. If the button is gray (set to the left), your account is public. Tap on the button to set it to the right; it will turn blue, which means your account is now private.

Final Thoughts

If your Instagram account is a personal one, it’s always best to keep it private. If you’re into some harmless online stalking but you don’t actually want to follow a person, the next best thing you can do is to search for them on Google and other social media platforms. The other methods of attempting to gain access to a private profile are deceptive and unethical — and, therefore, not recommended. Remember that any unethical behavior can get you blocked by your target individual and even banished from Instagram.

How to view a private Instagram profile

Parsing

Private Instagrams are not really that private. How bad is it?

Nikolai Udintsev

September 12, 2019 12:48

A new vulnerability has allegedly been discovered on Instagram that gives access to private profiles. Afisha Daily figured out how dangerous it is.

What happened?

Buzzfeed reported a vulnerability in closed Instagrams. If a subscriber of such a profile enters it through the web version and examines the page code in a browser, he will be able to find direct links to posts there, as well as to account histories. These links can then be opened by anyone, including those who are not subscribed to a closed account.

Is everything really bad?

Only people to whom the profile owner approved the subscription can copy the addresses of photos and stories from closed Instagrams. A random person will still not see any stories, posts, or links to them in a private profile.

The vulnerability can be compared to a screenshot. Similarly, any approved subscriber can take a screenshot of a story or post and then send it to anyone. Perhaps the screenshot is more dangerous for the privacy of the account, because it has a nickname and the time when the story was published, but they are not in the picture at the direct link.

Using the method, access to the avatars of people who liked or commented on posts in a closed and in any other profile is opened. This can be a problem for those who don't want people to explore their avatars. In the web version of Instagram, user avatars in comments have a low resolution - only 32x32 pixels, but from the website code you can get a link to an image of 150x150 pixels. Perhaps a larger image can be used for image search.

Direct links from the page code open images and videos even a few days after they disappeared or were deleted. It would be dangerous if this link could find the profile of the person who posted them. So far, there is no such possibility.

Is it difficult to find a direct link to someone else's story?

Very simple, watch the video.

What are they talking about on Instagram?

A Facebook spokesperson told The Verge that a direct link to an image from a post or story is like a screenshot. "It doesn't give people access to a private profile," he said. Buzzfeed does not agree with this, since the links contain information about how this picture was uploaded and what resolution it has. In addition, according to Buzzfeed, a direct link proves the authenticity of the content.

Is this really a threat to private profiles?

Yes, direct links give access to restricted information, just like screenshots. While these direct links cannot be attributed to a specific profile, it is difficult to imagine how they can be used to the detriment of a person. The same can be done in the web version of VKontakte: click on the picture and open the direct link with one more click. In the web version of Facebook, you can do the same. In the web version of Instagram, this is a little more difficult: you need to open the page code and look for a link in it. All these examples are arranged according to the same principle . There is a similar vulnerability in many social media.

Is this the first time this has happened?

There was a similar vulnerability in the Google Photos service. Through an internal tool, the user sent a link to their photo to a friend's email. In the interface, the function was perceived as if only one person, the recipient, could follow this link. But anyone could do it. This may have been a mistake by the developers, because a similar function in Google Drive did not provide such an opportunity, and the link was opened only by the recipient.

tell your friends

How to view a private Instagram profile without following?

Contents:

1 What can be seen in a closed profile?
2 Can I see photos in a private profile without a subscription?
3 How can I find out who a person is following in a private profile?
4 Life hacks on how to find a photo from a closed account
5 Questions from our readers

Every social network has privacy settings. They allow you to hide or show this or that information, this or that content. This is useful - we can "hide" from unwanted eyes. On the other hand, we cannot get full access to all profiles, and sometimes it is simply necessary. Let's talk about how to view a private Instagram profile without subscribing.

What can be seen in a closed profile?

How can I understand that the account is closed? By external signs. So, we see the number of publications, subscribers and subscriptions, nickname and account name, but we cannot consider publications. After we click on the "Subscribe" button, the user will receive an application. In this, closed pages are similar to VKontakte, where in order for a person to appear as a friend, he needs to confirm the application.

Is it possible to see photos in a private profile without a subscription?

As we understand, you can view the contents of private Instagram if you confirm us. Without registering or subscribing, you will not see his publications. How can this limitation be bypassed? Only tricks.

Five solutions come to my mind:

Find links to posts on other social networks or websites. If a person has an import configured, for example, VKontakte, photos will be displayed on their page.
View follower activity of person . You can see who is being liked by the people you follow. If among them there is a subscriber of the desired user who likes our "victim", you will see these liked posts.
Ask to look through the account of the user whose application was confirmed by . If you have mutual friends with a private user, they can help you.
Hacking . This point is here simply because hacking is one of the options. You need to understand that such actions can be punished. Also keep in mind that just choosing a freelancer who will give you a username and password will not work. There is a lot of deception in this area. But what exactly do you want when you order an illegal action?
Try with fake account . If a person does not confirm you specifically because of some of his own motives, you can try to create a fake that, for one reason or another, will be of interest to the user.

How can I find out who a person is following in a private profile?

The service does not give people the opportunity to view subscribers and subscriptions of private accounts. Therefore, as in YouTube, in order to get a rough picture of a person’s audience, we will have to try to cheat. One solution to this question comes to my mind: find another social profile. Almost all the people who follow me on Insta are VK friends. If at least the VKontakte page is open, you can view your friends there and roughly estimate who is subscribed to closed Instagram. You can also use Facebook, the photo network's satellite service. However, few people from the Russian-speaking Internet use FB as tightly as VK.

Life hacks on how to find a photo from a closed account

We figured out how to view a private Instagram profile without following. Namely, no way. But you can somehow get access to the posts? There are several hacks.

Let's get started:

Applications and services for browsing . There are many offers on the Internet that, for a small fee, are ready to help you with this task. BUT! I am writing this point here not because it works, but to warn you. No tools can give you this ability. And these tools only want to deceive you by stealing either the page or the money.
Try Google Images . I now googled my nickname and saw all my mistakes when I forgot to hide my identity in the screenshots in the articles. So you can try to find hidden posts.
Other services and social networks . Many people use the import of posts to other social networks. Therefore, you can see other user profiles if they are open. The best option in this regard is VKontakte, because almost everyone uses this site.
Search by hashtag . Many people take photos together, while marking those who are in the image. Of course, we won’t be able to look at the marks, but perhaps the user has a special hashtag, by entering which we can at least see posts with a person.

How to view photos on Instagram if the profile is closed? No way. If it could be done, there would be no point in having privacy. Of course, there are a number of tricks that you can use for your own purposes, but they do not allow you to fully implement your plan. There are many apps and services that promise to help get around this limitation. But it is always just a scam in order to get your money or account. Therefore, you should not even try to use such tools.

Questions from our readers

#1. I saw somewhere that there is an application through which you can see a closed account on Instagram? What is it called?

No such application.