Instagram is famous for being the place people go to keep an eye on their exes, long-lost best friends, and even current significant others. The practice is so popular that it has its own term, Instastalking — even if it’s nowhere near as creepy as true stalking. Most of us have done it at least here or there, but if you’re in the middle of seeing what someone has been up to, is there anything worse than accidentally clicking on their story and knowing they’ve been notified that you’re watching it?
Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to gather intel on people through Instagram, including by watching their stories anonymously. Let’s explore.
Why Might You Want to Watch Instagram Stories Anonymously?
First of all, why would you want to watch someone’s Instagram stories anonymously? You may already know that, unlike posts, Instagram stories will notify the user when anyone watches the story, even if you don’t like it or comment. This recently became an especially frustrating issue because Instagram and Facebook have begun putting stories into your newsfeed, and if you slightly pause your scrolling while the story is visible, it registers you as viewing the story.
In many cases, this is a recipe for awkward conversations. We all follow people on Instagram who we don’t keep in touch with often, but we may want to see what they’re up to out of curiosity. Or, you may be wanting to learn more about someone like a match on a dating app or a friend of a friend before you meet them. If they see that you’ve watched their stories, it could set an uncomfortable tone for the next time you see them,
Instagram is also a way to make sure your significant other, your child, or other people in your life aren’t engaging in things they shouldn’t like cheating, using drugs, or smoking or drinking underage. People often post more candid information in their stories than their posts because they know stories are more temporary. If they know you’re watching, they might be more guarded so that they’re still stepping outside the lines but it’s harder for you to know about it.
Top Ways to Learn About People on Instagram Discreetly
There are actually more ways to learn about people on Instagram discreetly and anonymously than you might realize. Consider these three strategies, for example.
1. Use an Instagram Activity Tracker
An Instagram activity tracker like Snoopreport is a unique tool that gives you the inside scoop and certain highly informative data about nearly anyone on Instagram. Snoopreport shows you, week by week, every post the person has liked, whose posts they’re liking most often, what they’re interested in based on their post activity, who has recently followed them, and more.
This is information you won’t get from their profile and it offers outstanding insight into who they’re interacting with and what they may be involved in online. It’s all done anonymously (it’s not even linked to your Instagram account, in fact), so the person has no idea you’re tracking their activity.
2. View Instagram Stories Anonymously
An all-time classic, viewing Instagram stories anonymously is a helpful way to learn more about someone without them knowing. Instagram stories are often a source for videos of nights out, semi-covert confessions, and peeks into a person’s life.
3. Use an App to Hack Their Account
There are many apps that have been made to hack into a user’s Instagram account and show you everything they would see: their stories, posts, direct messages, and more. This option is much dicier than the others, though.
These tools typically require you to get access to the person’s phone and install a spyware app without their knowledge. That makes it incredibly difficult to get this strategy off the ground from the start. On top of that, if the person discovers what you’re doing, they’ll probably view it as a severe violation of their privacy because you’re accessing information no one was meant to have. By contrast, Instagram stories and the data collected by Snoopreport are all information the person chose to make public, and you’re just collecting that information in a different way.
Ways to View Instagram Stories Anonymously
If you want to watch Instagram stories anonymously as part of your intel-gathering endeavor, there are a few ways to do it – some more effective and usable than others. Try these three options.
1. Make a Fake Account
You may have heard of a “finsta,” or a fake Instagram account. This is generally the easiest way to view Instagram stories “anonymously.”
You start by creating a new Instagram account that doesn’t reveal your name or any information that could be used to tie the account to you. You can log in with this account any time you want to watch stories and the person will be notified that the finsta has watched their story, but they won’t know that finsta is you.
There are some caveats, of course. If the person has a private account, they’ll need to accept your finsta’s follow request before you can see their stories, and some people are too cautious to accept requests from accounts they don’t recognize. Even if the person has a public account, they could block your finsta at any point.
The other challenge is that you need to be careful to only view their stories from this finsta, and to avoid posting any of your personal content to your finsta. It’s easy to accidentally post on the wrong account or view stories from the wrong account.
2. Use a Dedicated App
Many people want to watch Instagram stories anonymously, so naturally, companies and developers have created several Instagram story viewer apps and sites to do exactly this, like InstaStories, BlindStory, and Story Saver.
Use these with caution, though. Some of them don’t work at all and either won’t find the story or will reveal that you watched the story. Some can even be scams that open security risks for your device.
3. Use Airplane Mode
When you’re on any Instagram page, Instagram will automatically pre-load some content so that everything doesn’t disappear if you briefly lose your cell signal or wi-fi. You can use that to your advantage.
Open Instagram and pull up the person’s profile so that Instagram pre-loads any stories that are visible on the first page of their profile. Then, go to your phone’s settings and turn on airplane mode. If you go back to Instagram with airplane mode on, you should be able to watch the stories without Instagram realizing that you’ve watched them.
This method can be a bit spotty, though. You never know how much content Instagram will pre-load for certain, so you may not be able to see all the stories you want.
The Alternative: Snoopreport
Truth be told, there’s no 100% reliable way to watch Instagram stories anonymously. That’s why so many people are choosing to get their Instagram intel using an Instagram activity tracker instead. As a different kind of Instagram viewer, Snoopreport produces a weekly report of the person’s post likes and activity on the app. You can rest assured that the reports you receive are accurate, safe, and above-board.
To see for yourself what valuable insights you can gain using Snoopreport rather than an Instagram story viewer, sign up for Snoopreport today and try it for yourself.
