How to Turn Off Comments on Instagram (Complete Guide)

Instagram comments are crucial for building engagement, getting customer feedback, and maintaining customer relationships. But people often use the comment section to dump inappropriate or negative comments. 

Spams and inappropriate comments on your Instagram posts can ruin your brand reputation online. Reading those negative comments, your followers might think negatively, and it can even scare your loyal customers away. 

So, if you want to get rid of trolls, rude feedback, and spam comments, turning off the Instagram comment feature can help you out.

But how to do that?

In this post, we’ll show you how to turn off or disable Instagram comments following a few simple and easy steps.

Why You Should Turn Off Comments on Instagram?

People often go anonymous to post nasty or trolling comments in the digital world. They often troll individuals or businesses for their own enjoyment using cyberbullying tactics. 

That’s why turning off comments on Instagram can help you deal with these anonymous comments that add zero to your public accountability. 

Another reason to disable your comments on Instagram is to protect your brand reputation. When an Instagram user comments something negative on your post, it can negatively influence your other followers.

After reading a negative comment on your brand’s Instagram page, users who were thinking about following your page or purchasing services may think less about your brand’s reputation. 

Also, turning off comments on Instagram can help you put a stop to spam comments. Some businesses or companies on social media like to use your comment box as a place to self-promote. They may leave an irrelevant link to their page, website, or post on your Instagram comments. 

These kinds of spam and troll comments are frustrating and to discourage these behaviors, turning off comments is the best solution. 

How to Turn off Comments on a Live Instagram Post

If you want to turn off comments on published or already live Instagram posts, here are the steps you can follow:

Step 1. Open the Instagram app and head to your profile page. You can open your profile page by tapping on your profile picture icon. 

Step 2. Select the post you want to turn off comments. Then click on the three dots located at the top right corner, it will open a menu box.

Step 3. From the menu, select “Turn off commenting.” 

Once you’ve turned off the comment section on Instagram, the comment icon on that post will disappear. All the new and previous comments will disappear, so your comment box will be completely clutter-free. 

And after turning off the comments, none of your followers will be able to see old comments or make new comments. 

How to Restrict Comments on Instagram Posts

With the rise of online bullying and trolling, Instagram has come up with a Restrict Comments feature to fight such trolls and prevent unwanted interactions. 

After restricting someone on Instagram, their comments on your posts won’t be visible to you or anyone. 

However, if you wish, you can view their restricted comments. All you need to do is tap on the See Comment button. This will make the restricted comment public. From here, you can choose to ignore the comment or delete it altogether.

Also, make sure to note that when you restrict a user on Instagram, they won’t be able to DM you. Their messages will be moved to the Message Requests section. 

Here are the steps you can follow to restrict comments in your Instagram posts:

Step 1. Open the post, whose comment section you want to restrict, and select the “View all comments” button.

Step 2. Click and hold on to the user’s comment you want to restrict. If you’re an iPhone user, swipe left over that specific comment. 

Step 3. Now you’ll notice three icons (a pin, exclamation sign, and a bin). Select the exclamation icon, and it will open a menu on your screen with three options:

• Report this comment
• Restrict (username)
• Block (username)

Step 4. Tap on the Restrict button; it will show you a list of actions that’d be restricted from the specific user. 

Step 5. Now tap on the “Restrict Account” button to make that specific comment visible only to you and the user. 

If you change your mind and decide to unrestrict the particular user’s account, head to their profile, select the three-dot button, and tap on the “Unrestrict” option. 

How to Limit Comments on Instagram

If you feel like some of your followers are harassing you with their spam comments, you can choose to limit their comments from your posts temporarily. 

Using the limit comments feature, you can limit users for up to four weeks, but you can extend the time period as long as you want. 

Before turning on the limit comments feature, make sure to remember:

• Instagram accounts you decide to limit can still comment on your posts, but their comets will be hidden unless you decide to approve them.
• Any DMs these limited accounts will send to you will be hidden.
• You can decide to ignore or review these comments.
• Any comment made during the time that limit feature is on will stay hidden even after the selected time has ended. 

Here are the steps you can follow to limit comments on Instagram:

Step 1. Open your Instagram account and go to your profile. Tap on the three-line icon at the top-right-hand corner of your screen.

Step 2. Head to Settings> Privacy> Comments.

Step 3. Select “Allow Comments From.” A menu will open up, from there, you’ll get four options:

• Everyone
• People you follow and your followers
• People you follow
• Your followers

Step 4. Select the most appropriate option according to your preference. 

How to Hide Offensive Comments on Instagram

Instagram can be a nasty place if you don’t know how to get rid of offensive comments. Manually deleting each troll comment can be time-consuming and frustrating. That’s why learning how to hide comments on Instagram can help you ignore them. Here are the steps you can follow:

Step 1. Open Instagram and go to your profile page. Tap on the three horizontal lines button located at the top right-hand corner of your screen. 

Step 2. Now go to Settings > Privacy > Hidden words.

Step 3. Next, toggle the “Hide comments” button to hide spam or nasty comments that are made on your Instagram posts. 

Step 4. You can further hide more comments by enabling the Hide more comments button. 

Hide Comments On Instagram Based On Keywords

If you decide to hide comments based on specific keywords, make sure to toggle the “Manual filter” button. This will open a small box in front of you, where you can enter the keywords you’d like to hide. 

So, if anyone posts an offensive or trolling comment that contains similar keywords, Instagram will automatically filter out and hide them from your posts. 

You can also hide comments on Instagram from a particular user by blocking them. The option to block comments is different from blocking an account, as the blocked user will be able to view your posts. 

But the comments they’ll leave on your posts will only be visible to them. All you need to do is select the “Block comments from” button and type their username. 

How to Turn off Comments on Instagram Live

Instagram gives you full access to control your Instagram Live. While streaming live, you can decide who should go live with you, who can leave comments on your Live, whether your audience can access your live session or not. 

You can turn off comments on Instagram live wherever you want by following these simple steps:

Step 1. First, open your Instagram app and start a live video session by going to the stories section and tapping on the live option. 

Step 2. After starting the live video, select the three dots at the right-hand corner of the “Add a Comment” box. 

Step 3. This will open a menu from their tap on “turn off commenting.”

Step 4. Now you’ll notice that “comments off” are written in the comment box. This will stop any viewer from commenting on your Live. 

However, if you’ve changed your mind and want to see what your followers are talking about, select the same three dots and tap in the “Turn on commenting” option. This will re-enable the comment box for everyone to share their feedback. 

How to Disable Comments on Instagram Story

Instagram allows your followers to reply and react to your Instagram stories. If you’re an influencer or have a large following base, turning off comments on Instagram stories might save your account from getting flooded with hundreds of messages in your inbox. 

You can disable comments on your Instagram stories by following these simple steps:

Step 1. Open your Instagram profile and select the three horizontal lines icon or the hamburger icon located at the top right corner of your device. 

Step 2. This will open a menu box; from there, select settings > privacy.

Step 3. From the Privacy tab and under the Interactions section, tap on the Story option. 

Step 4. Under the “Allow message replies” section, you’ll see a blue tick visible on the Everyone option. This blue tick indicates that everyone can reply to your stories. 

Step 5. Select the circle in front of the “Off” option, so the blue tick changes from “Everyone” to “Off”. This indicates that now you’ve turned off the comments option to your Instagram stories. 

Here’s a heads up. In the same story tab, under the “Allow message replies” section, if you select the “People you follow” option, you’ll limit the number of replies to people whom you follow. 

Once you turn off comments in your stories, your followers won’t see the “Send Message” box below your stories. However, note that turning off your stories’ comment box won’t stop your followers from sending you normal DMs. 

How to Turn off Comments on Instagram Reels

Reels is undoubtedly one of the best features on Instagram that drives tons of engagement. But sometimes, too much engagement can bring unnecessary comments that are irrelevant to your brand or products. 

Such irrelevant comments can damage your online reputation. That’s why you can follow these simple steps to turn off comments on Instagram reels:

Step 1. Open your Instagram page and go to the reels section. Now you’ll notice all the reels you’ve posted till now. 

Step 2. Now select the reel whose comments you want to turn off. Once the reel starts to play, look for the three vertical dots sign located at the bottom right corner of your screen. 

Step 3. Tap on the three dots and open the reel’s settings menu box. 

Step 4. Select the “Turn off commenting” option to stop your flowers from commenting on your reel. After turning off the comments, you’ll see the comments icon isn’t visible anymore. 

If you wish to see comments. Again, tap on the three dots and select “Turn on commenting” from the menu. 

Wrapping Up

And that’s it! Now you know how easily you can turn off comments on Instagram for all your posts, stores, reels, and even live videos. 

If you’re already frustrated with managing offensive, troll, and spam comments, you can even hide those comments and ignore them altogether. 

Comments are necessary to bring engagement, but it’s best to delete them when they become annoying.

Only this way you can put an end to online trolling and spam.