How to See Who Someone Recently Followed on Instagram (2025 Guide)

If you’re trying to see who your friend’s latest followers are, or you’re trying to keep an eye on a partner’s Instagram activity, there’s unfortunately no straightforward way to do this. Instagram doesn’t offer a direct setting to display another user’s recent follows in chronological order and in fact the order of followers or following lists on Instagram isn’t strictly chronological at all.

Instagram's follower lists are arranged by an internal algorithm, so when you view someone's followers or the list of accounts they follow, Instagram shows accounts with mutual connections or those you interact with first, rather than listing everything by date.

Do Third Party Tools Work?

If you search online, you'll find browser extensions and apps claiming to let you see another person's recent followers, but Instagram's terms of service forbid unauthorized data scraping or using automation to collect information so using third-party apps or extensions that log into your account can pose security risks or violate these terms. The fact is that Instagram does not provide this data to users, and any tool that does so is working around restrictions or outright lying to you in order to get your private information.

How to View Recent Followers on Your Own Account

While you can't easily see someone else's latest followers, you can keep tabs on your own recent followers using a few methods.

Notifications Feed

Whenever someone follows you on Instagram, you'll get a notification.At the top, you might see filtering options like Following and You - swipe until you find Follows or use the filter drop-down on desktop and select Follows to filter your notifications. The newest followers will appear at the top of that list.

Followers List

You can also manually look at your followers list on your profile. Go to your Instagram profile page and tap Followers to bring up the list of accounts that follow you.

On mobile, this list often appears in reverse chronological order, meaning the people at the top are likely the most recent followers.

On the web, Instagram sometimes only shows a subset of recent followers by default, rather than the full list, so it's a bit less useful.

Keep in mind, Instagram's algorithm might still shuffle this list a bit based on interaction or suggestions, for example, verified accounts or people with mutual connections might appear higher.

Search In Followers

While this isn't directly helpful for chronological order, it can help you spot new names. If you have a hunch about someone who might have followed you recently, you can search their username to confirm if they're in your followers.

How to See Someone's Followers List

Even though you can't sort someone else's followers by recency, you can still view their followers list.

To see anyone's list of followers or the accounts they follow, simply go to their profile page and tap on the Followers or Following count.

If the account is public, you have full access to scroll through their followers or following.

If the account is private and you're not an approved follower, you won't be able to see their lists at all. There's no way around that except requesting to follow them.

Often, Instagram will show a section at the top called Mutual if you have mutual followers in common with that person - these users will be listed first.

The Following List Order

We've talked about followers, but what about the list of accounts someone follows? People often wonder if they can see who someone recently followed (not just who followed them).

It turns out that Instagram's Following list is also sorted by an algorithm, but on your own profile, if you go to your Following list, Instagram might show you the accounts you interact with most at the top by default.

If you’re looking at someone else's profile and tap on the number of people they are following, it often shows you any mutual accounts first (accounts that both you and that person follow), and then a list that's influenced by factors like how popular those followed accounts are, or categories of accounts.

Finding New People to Follow

Instagram is always suggesting profiles and content, but if you want to proactively find fresh accounts, there are a couple of handy features.

Search And Explore

Tap the magnifying glass icon in the Instagram app to use the Search function. Here you can type keywords, hashtags, or names relevant to your interests. The results will show you top accounts, posts, and tags related to that term.

Similarly, the Explore page will show you posts and Reels based on accounts you already follow and content you engage with. If the Explore feed shows content you're not interested in, remember you can long-press on a post and tap Not Interested to fine-tune what Instagram recommends.

Sync Your Contacts

Instagram can connect to your phone's contact list to find people you know who are on the platform. To do this, go to your profile, tap the menu, and choose Follow And Invite Friends -> Follow Contacts.

Removing Unwanted Followers

If you have some spam accounts following you, or an ex-friend that you don't want viewing your posts anymore you can remove a follower without them being notified.

On Mobile

Go to your profile and tap on your Followers count to open the list.

Scroll or search for the user you want to remove.

Tap Remove and confirm.

On Desktop

Go to Instagram.com on your computer and navigate to your profile. Click on Followers to open the list. Each follower entry will have a Remove button beside it here as well. Click Remove for the person you want to cut off, and confirm when prompted.

How to Get More Instagram Followers

Whether you're trying to grow a business, become an influencer, or just broaden your reach, increasing your follower count is a common goal, and thankfully it’s not an impossible one!

Follow Trains and Engagement Groups

You might have seen or heard of follow-for-follow schemes or follow trains. These are organized activities (often by a specific account or hashtag) where participants agree to follow each other to boost everyone's numbers. By doing so, you could gain dozens or hundreds of followers quickly, because everyone involved is following everyone else. While it does work to an extent, many of the followers you gain are only doing it to get followed back, so they might not engage with your content at all. Your feed can also become chaotic, since you're obliged to follow a bunch of strangers who may post content you don't actually care about.

Plus, if your account has a following-to-followers ratio that is roughly 1:1 with a bunch of random accounts, it could appear a bit suspicious to outside observers or to Instagram's algorithm. Brands looking for influencers sometimes check for a healthy ratio (more followers than following) as a sign of an authentic audience and follow trains can mess with that ratio. Use this method sparingly, if at all, and be prepared to later unfollow accounts that clutter your feed (which is tedious and can also lead to those people unfollowing you in return).

Buying Instagram Followers

The fastest way to increase your follower count is to simply purchase followers. Yes, it's a thing - and it's actually quite common, especially among new influencers and small businesses. There are services like QQTube where you can pay a few dollars and get a specified number of followers delivered to your account.

When done properly through a reputable provider, buying followers can quickly grow your numbers with real follower accounts, which can make your profile appear more popular or credible at a glance. For example, if a brand sees you have 10,000 followers, they might take you more seriously than if you have 200 and give you a sponsorship deal.

It's important to buy from a trustworthy source that delivers high-quality followers since low-quality services might send you obvious bot accounts that could drop off after a while or potentially get your account flagged. Always do your research and see reviews for any follower service.

When done right, this method is quick and effective but consider it a way to supplement your growth, and don’t make it the only thing you do. Continue creating quality content and engaging with your followers so that they have something to stick around for.

Collaborative Giveaways and Shoutouts

Another strategy is collaborating with other users for shoutouts or giveaways, which often involves partnering with someone in your niche.

Giveaways are popular too, and an account might run a contest where entry requires people to follow their account and tag friends. While some of the gained followers might unfollow after it's a generally accepted way to spike your follower numbers in a short time and potentially retain a portion of those new followers who genuinely like your content.

No matter which method you choose, pair it with consistently scheduled content, and make sure you use Instagram’s different content types (Stories, Reels, etc) for the most impact on your account’s growth.