If you’ve been wondering how to hide mutual friends on Instagram, the short answer is that there’s no direct feature for it. Instagram automatically shows mutual followers, and you can’t turn that off completely.
What you can do is adjust your privacy settings and use a few smart workarounds to limit who sees your connections. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the latest methods.
Why Can’t We Hide Mutual Friends Directly on Instagram?
Instagram automatically shows mutual friends to highlight shared connections and encourage engagement. The platform calculates and displays mutuals based on your following/follower networks, and there’s no toggle to turn it off.
This means whenever someone visits your profile, they’ll see mutuals depending on account visibility. While this boosts interaction, it leaves users with little direct control over hiding those connections.
Why You Might Want to Hide Your Mutual Friends
Your mutual friends say a lot about you, sometimes more than you’d like. If someone stumbles across your profile, seeing shared connections can reveal your social circle, work relationships, or even private family ties. That’s not always information you want to hand out freely.
For example, maybe you don’t want coworkers checking which friends you have outside of work, or you’d rather keep your family life separate from your online persona. Mutuals also make it easier for strangers to map out your network, which can feel invasive and raise privacy concerns.
Knowing how to hide mutual friends on Instagram is just a way to keep parts of your life separate. The fewer people who can peak into your connections, the safer and more private your Instagram experience becomes.
What Can You Do To Hide Your Mutual Friends on Instagram?
Since Instagram doesn’t allow you to fully turn off mutual friends, the best approach is to manage your account settings and connections strategically.
1. Set Your Account to Private
Switching from public to private stops strangers from viewing your follower and following list, which also limits how mutuals are displayed. Though approved followers will still see shared connections, outsiders won’t.
2. Limit Followers via Removal or Blocking
Actively removing or blocking certain users breaks those shared links, reducing the number of mutual friends shown and giving you more control over who can map your network.
3. Use a Secondary Account (Shadow Profile)
Some people prefer running a secondary Instagram account for select friends, colleagues, or family. This “shadow account” helps separate different parts of your life while limiting how mutuals show up on your main profile.
Step-by-Step: How to Limit Who Sees Your Mutual Friends
As Instagram doesn’t allow you to directly hide mutual friends, the best you can do is control who sees your follower and following lists. Here’s how:
1. Switch Your Account to Private
Turning your profile private ensures that only approved followers can see your connections.
- Open the Instagram app and go to your profile.
- Tap the three lines (menu icon) in the top right.
- Select Settings and Privacy.
- Scroll to Account Privacy.
- Toggle on Private Account.
Once private, strangers can’t see your followers or following lists, reducing exposure of mutuals.
2. Remove Followers You Don’t Trust
Even with a private account, approved followers can still see mutual friends. You can remove specific people without blocking them.
- Go to your profile and tap on Followers.
- Find the follower you want to remove.
- Tap Remove next to their name.
3. Block for Complete Cut-Off
If you don’t want someone to see your profile, posts, or mutual friends at all, blocking is the only option.
- Visit the user’s profile page.
- Tap the three dots in the top-right corner.
- Choose Block.
- Confirm your choice.
How Instagram Decides Which Mutuals to Show
Ever wondered why certain people show up as your mutual friends while others don’t? Instagram doesn’t display them randomly. The app actually uses an algorithm to decide which mutuals appear on a profile.
It looks at things like:
- How often do you interact with that person (likes, DMs, comments).
- Whether you’ve recently searched or viewed their profile.
- How relevant Instagram thinks that connection is to you.
So, if you notice some names popping up more often, it’s because Instagram is prioritizing people you engage with most. This means even if you can’t completely hide mutual friends, knowing how the system works gives you more context about why certain connections are more visible than others.
Alternative Instagram Privacy Features You Should Use
Hiding mutual friends is just one piece of the puzzle. Instagram offers other privacy tools that can help you take control of what others see:
- Hide Your Activity Status
By default, people can see when you were last active. Turning this off keeps you less visible.
- Go to Settings and privacy.
- Tap on Messages and story replies.
- Tap on Show Activity Status.
- Toggle it off.
- Restrict Accounts Instead of Blocking
If you don’t want to block someone but still want to limit their access, “Restrict” is a softer option.
- Their comments on your posts are visible only to them.
- They can’t see when you’re online.
- They won’t know you’ve restricted them.
- Hide Stories and Close Friends List
You can control who sees your stories by:
- Hiding a story from specific people under Settings and privacy → Story → Hide story from.
- Using the Close Friends list to share with only selected followers.
- Limit Who Can Comment or Mention You
Under Settings and privacy → Comments / Mentions, you can decide:
- Who can comment on your posts.
- Who can tag or mention you.
This reduces unwanted exposure from mutual connections and keeps your profile interactions more private.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. Instagram doesn’t support hiding mutuals directly. You can limit visibility through privacy settings or account management.
Yes, but only from users who don’t follow you. Approved followers can still view mutuals.
Blocking permanently removes all visibility of mutuals with that person. Removing them hides mutuals unless they follow you again.
No. Changing account type (personal to creator/business) does not alter mutual visibility.
Switch to a private account and carefully manage followers. A secondary account adds another layer, but increases complexity.
Closing Thoughts
While Instagram doesn’t let you toggle off mutual friend visibility directly, adopting a private account, managing followers, or using a secondary profile can help achieve your privacy goals. Each method carries trade-offs, but all are feasible today.
For an extra layer of control beyond Instagram, using PureVPN helps protect your browsing activity and keeps your digital life more private.
Arsalan Rashid
August 22, 2025
2 months ago
