1% of profit go to fighting climate change 1% of profit go to fighting climate changeFind out how many of your followers are ghosts: accounts that follow you but never like, comment or post. Enter your username and we check a sample of your newest followers.
A ghost follower is an account that follows you but never interacts. Some are real people who stopped using Instagram. Others are bots or fake accounts made to sell followers or to follow people in bulk.
Ghost followers count towards your follower number, but they never like or comment. So they lower your engagement rate. If 5,000 followers give you 150 likes and comments a post, your rate is 3%. Add 2,000 ghosts and the same 150 interactions give you 2.1%.
Instagram lets outside tools see a pool of your most recent followers. We take a sample of up to 60 of them and open each profile. Then we look for signs of a ghost or bot account:
One sign on its own proves nothing, because plenty of real people never post. We only count a follower as a ghost when several signs appear together. Because we check a sample, the result shows a range for your whole follower base.
Almost every account has some ghost followers, so a small share is nothing to worry about. If the share is high, or your engagement rate has been falling, removing the obvious bots is worth doing.
Instagram also removes fake accounts it finds on its own, which is why follower counts sometimes drop overnight.
Most ghost followers arrive in the same few ways: follow-for-follow groups, giveaway loops that attract prize hunters, and bought followers. Each one adds people who have no interest in what you post.
The followers who stay active are the ones who found you because of your content, your niche or your area. Our guide to why Instagram engagement drops covers the other causes of a falling engagement rate.
If you would like a team to do the growth work for you, that is what Sup Growth does. A person on our team engages by hand with real people in your niche and area, from your account, and new followers get a welcome message. Clients typically gain 300 to 800 real followers a month, and the first 14 days are free.
See them all on our free Instagram tools page.
Almost every account has some, because people stop using Instagram and bots follow accounts at random. What matters more is whether the share is growing and whether your engagement rate is falling.
They lower your engagement rate, because they count as followers but never react. Instagram first shows a post to some of your followers, so a large share of ghosts can mean fewer early likes and comments.
Instagram removes accounts it finds to be fake or spam. Inactive real accounts are not removed, so those stay until you remove them yourself.
Removing a lot of followers very quickly can trigger Instagram's limits. Remove them in small batches over a few days.
Instagram only shows outside tools a pool of each account's most recent followers. So the checker samples your newest followers and gives a range, not a count of every follower.
Yes. There is no sign-up and we never ask for your password. Results are saved for 7 days, so checking the same account again that week is instant.
Real, targeted followers from a human team. Nothing is charged until day 15, and you can cancel at any time.