6 Reasons Why Instagram Blocks You. To-Do Actions if You Get Banned [Updated]

Julia Minnie

5 years ago

Imagine the following scenario. You created a business account on Instagram and kept investing a lot of time and money into your page development.

After a while, you are beyond happiness: your page already has interesting and stylish content, a certain number of followers and unique connections with popular bloggers.

But the happiness doesn’t last long. One day, your Instagram goes crazy and for some reason blocks your account. And the worst thing is that you are not even sure why you were banned. Instagram does not even warn users before blocking their profiles.

Seems like your kind of a situation? Then I’ll tell you what to do.

6 Reasons why you can be blocked from Instagram
Wait, I am already banned, what do I do? 5 steps to restore a disabled Instagram profile

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Why Can I Be Blocked on Instagram?

Reason #1: Mass following and Massliking

The most apparent sign of receiving a temporary block from Instagram is through trying to grow a significant number of likes and followers at one time. This can happen in both cases if you have used third-party promotion tools or performed manual actions without studying the users’ profiles.

Just take your smartphone and check all the spammers that followed you a week ago. I am sure 80% of those accounts will already be blocked. The most likely reason for this would be because they exceeded the limits on follows and likes.

Limits and restrictions according to official Instagram reference:

a maximum number of likes per hour: 60;
a maximum number of comments per hour: 60;
a maximum number of follows per hour: 60;
a maximum number of messages per hour: 60.

But if your account is fairly new, the limits are different:

a maximum number of likes per hour: 30;
a maximum number of comments per hour: 30;
a maximum number of follows/unfollows per hour: 30.

Important reminder. Instagram adds up the number of follows and unfollows as well as blocking the unwanted users. In total, you can’t take more than 1440 actions on your account daily. Make sure you spread out these actions accordingly.

Violation of Instagram rules leads to a temporary block. It involves limiting the profile’s functionality. You won’t be able to comment, like, follow or write in Direct Messages for a period of time (from 2 hours to 2 weeks).

If you are lucky enough to get blocked temporarily, don’t do anything with your profile and don’t write anywhere. Just give it a little rest before it’s completely restored.

Reason #2: Excessively Frequent Publications

Instagram monitors the algorithm of publications from one account. The thing is, only the social network knows what the accurate and safest number of publications is. Therefore, it would be advisable not to follow the example of other accounts that may frequently publish posts and get nothing for it.

The optimal advice for every profile is to make pauses between posts. By doing this, you will not be suspected of spamming and other manipulations. Also, we recommend that you do not publish the same photo at the same time from different accounts. Als you can use social media templates, if you want your posts to look really awesome.

Reason #3: Copyright Infringement

The copyright issue is a big deal on Instagram. All images in your account have to be either yours or permitted by the author. If you want to share somebody else’s image, tag the author in the photo (provided he has an Instagram account) and give credit to the author in the description. If you use images for commercial purposes, you will need to ask the author’s permission. Moreover, if you post a video with music to which you don’t have the rights, Instagram will remove such a post for sure.

What is the outcome of ignoring the copyright rules? The author can report you to Instagram for using the photo without their agreement or specifying the authorship and you can be blocked for copyright infringement.

Reason #4: Images/Videos Violating Social Network Rules

Photos and videos featuring naked bodies, sexual content and violence are considered inappropriate. Whatever goals you pursue, posting such inappropriate content can get you banned - so be forewarned.

Reason #5: User Complaints

Someone thought your account was a threat, so they clicked the “Report” button. If there are other people also reporting your account, Instagram will sooner or late block your profile. People can complain of different reasons: mass liking, mass following, insults, inappropriate content, spam etc. So, generally speaking, everything that I mentioned above can result in your account being blocked.

Reason #6: Different IP addresses and Devices

If you log into your account from multiple devices and confirm it via SMS, the platform is less likely to ban you. However, if it happens that you log in from different devices and IP-addresses, Instagram may think your account has been hacked by scammers. The social network reacts to it almost instantly and blocks the profile for your own safety.

5 To-Do Actions To Restore Your Account

Oops, you got blocked for some reason? Sh*t happens, so no worries.

Oftentimes, Instagram "punishes" profiles with a temporary block (I mentioned this at the beginning of the article). This means one or several actions normally open to you will be restricted. For example, you are forbidden to like and follow.

Like I said, if you have been blocked temporarily, do NOTHING about. It just makes no sense. Wait until Instagram finally hands back your privileges and you are good to go. Just make sure you do not repeat the actions that got you a temporary block ever again.

The serious deal is when you have been disabled. Instagram has a right to block users without warning them if their profiles violate the Community Guidelines or Terms of Use. So make sure you read both carefully.

As you try to log in to your account, you’ll be notified of an error saying:

If you believe that your account was blocked in error, you can appeal the decision.

If you do not see the notification, then you may have issues with the login. If you or someone else deleted the account, Instagram won’t be able to recover it. You can create a new account with the same email address, but it's likely that you won’t be able to use the old username again.

Unless someone deletes your account completely, there is a chance for your profile to survive. Follow these 5 to-do steps and your profile WILL BE saved.

If you see the following message, click the "Learn more" button.
You will see a message from Instagram and at the bottom, you can click the "Let us know" button to report that your profile was disabled by mistake.
There will be a new question on the next screen to specify whether this is a commercial or personal page. Since you have a business account, choose "Yes".
Fill out the form. To restore a business account, you specify your full name, Instagram username as well as the email address.
Also, the platform asks you to attach a document that proves your relationship to the company/business. Examples of such documents are your local license, registration certificate, confirmation of a domain name registration etc.
Click “Send” and … wait for the email! The answer should come fairly soon, usually within 1-2 business days.

The most inquisitive users may be a little disappointed because they do not reveal the reason why your account was disabled. Alas, the secret will stay forever with the Instagram support team. You can only guess...

Update on 28.01.19

So, the comments section is bursting from requests to help users unblock their accounts and saying that my guideline does not work in all cases. It’s a pity to hear a lot of stories telling that Instagram support reacts differently to people’s requests to unblock their profiles, counting on the fact that it’s typically done by a machine.

So here’s what I did. I tried to research this question on HARO (Help a Reporter) platform to get some real stories on how people manage to deal with the block issue. Fortunately, I got a piece of very handy advice from Johannes - creator of GettingGrowth blog where you’ll find handy Instagram masterclasses and even a free Instagram e-mail course to sign for.

This is what he recommended:

“Hey!
My account was blocked a few years back and I've been working with many clients that have faced similar issues.
So what has been working for me and some of the other accounts is to go through Facebook Ads Support. This is only for ads, but they take you in anyway. Over an e-mail works well. When you start the support ticket always mention that you know somebody from the team or already have been in contact with somebody. There's a place in the form for that. I usually write mark@fb.com (mark as... well you know), but I believe you could write whoever there. Either way this gets really fast replies and if they give a negative answer then you can try to approach them from a different angle. For example my domain https://gettinggrowth.com was blocked by Instagram and Facebook for a long time and I complained about not being able to reset my password. This was true since the domain was blocked and their system didn't send the recovery e-mail. Once they fixed that, my domain got whitelisted in the process. Hope that helps.“

I also hope this tip might help you all in some way. Let me know if this worked for you =)

Wrapping up…

I listed the most common reasons why business profiles can get a temporary block or even get disabled. But let’s keep in mind that Instagram has its own technical failures and bugs like any other social network.

You do not always get disabled because of some fault on your part - it can be a silly Instagram mistake that you CAN and SHOULD fix.

Once your account is blocked or disabled, keep calm and … follow our instructions!