Can You See Who Views Your Instagram Story?

So, you shared an Instagram story and are curious about who viewed it. There are many reasons for wanting to see who viewed your story, like checking for stalkers or deleting a story you accidentally shared.

But, what if I told you that there is a way to see who has seen your Instagram stories? A simple way to check if your story has been seen by someone you did not want to see it?

I will explain how to get more detailed information on who has viewed your story and show you some tips on controlling who is able to view them.

Can You See Who Views Your Instagram Story?

Yes, you absolutely can see who viewed your Instagram stories. Instagram’s Activity card allows all its users to do so with ease.

Precisely, this can be done by opening up the Instagram app, tapping on your profile picture, swiping down, and looking through the people who saw your story. You can see both the number of people who saw it and the exact usernames of those that did so.

Check Who Viewed Your Instagram Story on the App

Here is how to check who viewed your story:

Check Who Viewed Your Instagram Story on Desktop

You can easily see who viewed your stories by using a desktop computer as well. The process is quite similar to checking the list of viewers on your phone.

Here is how to check how many people saw your story on your desktop:

Check Who Viewed Your Expired Instagram Story

The viewer list can not be checked after your story has expired. But, you can see all your stories in the stories archive.

Can Someone View Your Story Without You Knowing?

Regardless of if you have a private or a public profile, third-party apps allow their users to view stories anonymously. The people who view stories via these apps don’t have to provide their log-in information or username, or even have an Instagram account to look through stories.

A private profile will guarantee you a bit more privacy as only your followers can see your stories, but so can the users of third-party apps. Also, even people who use these apps will not be able to see expired Instagram stories.

3 Tips to Control Who Views Your Instagram Stories

Here are some tips which will help you control who views your stories:

Switch to a Private Account

As previously mentioned, if you would like to have full control of who can view both your page and your stories, switching to a private profile may be the best path to take. This solution may not be ideal for everyone, but it is the most efficient.

By choosing to do this, you are not only protecting the privacy of your posted stories but also any photo or video posted, and only the number of people you allow to follow you will have access to your profile. This ensures that only you can choose specifically who views your profile page.

This can easily be done through Instagram settings:

Use the Close Friends Feature

If, however, you want to keep your profile public, creating a close friends list would be perfect for you. These lists allow only you to control who can view your stories by simply adding them to your close friends.

Also, you can always add or remove people from this list, ensuring that you choose only the people you truly want to see your stories there.

Here is how to activate and use the close friends feature:

Hide Stories from Some Accounts

This feature also allows you to keep your profile public and guarantee privacy. This is the opposite of the close friends list. Hiding stories from certain accounts lets you choose what users will never be able to see your stories.

Anyone you put on this list, no matter if your profile is public or private, will not be able to see any of the stories you post. Of course, you can choose to unhide your stories from those people at any time.

Here is how to use the Hide Story feature:

1. Open your Instagram profile
2. Go to the search bar in the bottom left corner
3. Type the name of the user you want to hide your story from
4. Click on their profile
5. Click on the three dots in the right corner

6. Select the Hide your story option

7. Select the Hide option

Conclusion

All in all, checking who viewed your story is very much possible and easy to do with a bit of practice. This can be done by using both a phone and a desktop computer, and the process of checking is quite similar.

Also, users can look at your stories without you even knowing, so beware of posting stories on your public Instagram account. These people don’t even show up in your story viewers, so you may never know they did this.

There are several ways to protect your privacy on Instagram with or without switching to a private account, and you should be aware of all of these features to calmly post whatever you want.

FAQ