On this page
paste your handle. find out if the algorithm forgot you.
what this tool does
Takes an Instagram handle, reads public reach signals — recent post and reel view-counts against your historical baseline, hashtag indexability (do your posts appear in their tag feeds when searched?), explore-page visibility, story reach decay, follower-growth rate — and returns a probability score: how likely it is that your account is currently suppressed. No login. We're not in your account; we're looking at your account the way a stranger searching for you would see it.
The output is a 0–100 score, an explanation of which signals contributed, and a tailored recovery checklist.
why this matters
Instagram's suppression is more granular than TikTok's. You can be shadowbanned only on hashtag-search while still showing up on follower feeds. You can be reach-throttled on Reels but not on the grid. You can be quietly de-prioritized on the explore page without losing follower reach at all. Most creators discover one of these and assume it's the only one happening, when actually two or three are stacked.
The checker exists because Instagram's suppression layers are not visible to the account-holder. From inside the app, your posts show up; your stories play; your DMs arrive. The throttling is on the discovery side — the side that matters for growth, for bio-link clicks, for everything that turns followers into income. Without a tool that reads the discovery side from outside, you're guessing what's wrong, and the guesses are usually wrong.
We wrote the diagnostic and recovery depth at /instagram-shadowban (the pillar). This tool is the front door — fast triage, then read the pillar for what to actually do about it.
If the suppression you're experiencing is the bio link rather than the reach — viewers tap your bio link and lose their session, your domain triggers Instagram's "this link may be unsafe" warning, or your domain is on Instagram's blocked-domains list — that's a different problem this tool won't catch. Read /help/instagram-blocked-my-domain for that branch.
what you'll see
Handle input. @yourhandle or yourhandle. One field, one Check button.
Pull state. A few seconds while we read recent-post reach, hashtag-search visibility, story reach, and follower velocity.
Score card. A 0–100 score banded into low / moderate / likely / very likely. One verdict line.
Layer breakdown. Unlike the TikTok version, Instagram's results split across layers:
- Feed reach — visibility to your existing followers
- Hashtag visibility — do your posts surface in tag-search feeds
- Explore visibility — are you appearing on strangers' explore pages
- Reel reach — separate reach signal for Reels specifically
- Story reach — follower stories views vs baseline
Each layer scores independently, so the card might read feed: clean / hashtags: suppressed / explore: throttled / reels: throttled / stories: clean. Discovery is throttled; existing-follower channels are not.
Contributing signals. The specific data behind each layer's verdict — Reels avg views: 1,200 (baseline 14k, -91%), hashtag-search posts: 0 of 6 recent tags surface your posts, etc.
Recovery checklist. Tailored. If it's a hashtag issue: a sequence on auditing recent posts for community-guidelines flags and resetting hashtag pools. If Reels are suppressed: a content-mix audit and a 7-day posting-pause protocol. If explore is throttled: a different protocol again.
Depth link. "Read the full diagnostic →" → /instagram-shadowban.
who this is for
Instagram creators whose discovery reach dropped and who need a structured triage before guessing at fixes.
Brand managers and agencies monitoring multi-account rosters for sudden reach collapses.
OnlyFans, Patreon, and other subscription creators whose Instagram is the top of the funnel and whose subscriber acquisition tracks directly with Instagram discoverability. When the checker flags suppression here, it's an early warning on next month's churn-replacement gap.
currently in development
We're building this. Instagram is harder than TikTok because the suppression layers are more granular and the public signal collection involves more endpoints. We're tuning the layer thresholds against creator-data partners now.
Get notified when the checker ships.
in the meantime
If you need to check today:
- TAMEYO runs a free Instagram shadowban check. Open TAMEYO's checker{rel="nofollow"} — third-party, methodology is reasonable.
- Dolphin Radar covers Instagram and TikTok with a freemium model. Open Dolphin Radar{rel="nofollow"} — same.
- The manual method: Open Instagram in incognito on the web (or while logged out on a different device). Search for hashtags you recently used. Scroll the tag-feed. If your post doesn't appear at the position its view-count would predict, the hashtag is suppressed for your post. Repeat across 4–6 recent hashtags. Two or more suppressed = a discovery-layer shadowban is the most parsimonious explanation.
related
Continue reading:
Sister tool:
- TikTok shadowban checker — same idea, different platform
If your problem is link-side, not reach-side:
Related tools: