Instagram Will Soon Let You Mute Friends Who Spam

To combat the selfie and food blog spams, Instagram now has the option to mute people from appearing in your feed. This update rolls out over the next coming weeks, and you’ll be able to choose to hide someone’s posts, their stories, or even both from popping up on the main screen. Don’t worry, you will still be able to view a muted person’s profile. They won’t know they have been muted and you can unmute them at any time.

This feature seems to be long overdue as the social media platform is flooded with more photos every day. While the unfollow feature is appealing, it is often times a little too much. If a close relative posts 12 times a day, would you still unfollow them? Having to add them back after a certain period of time may create awkwardness. Instead, you can choose to mute the loud profile, while preserving your real life relationships.

This tool aims to be a less aggressive option than unfollowing another user. Users can now personalize their feeds based on what they want to see. To mute an account, simply tap the “…” menu next to an account handle, and choose “Mute Posts.”

IG has come a long way but still remains the simplest platform. With the addition of the “stories” and “explore” option, there is still much content to display to you. But as networks get older, more people and friends are added and feeds start to clog up. It becomes an all or nothing space. Either stay un-private and get crept on or be private to protect yourself. Unfollow someone annoyingly posting their life status every 30 minutes or continue to follow them and deal with it. Like its parent company, Facebook, adding a mute button is far more respectful of kinships. It’s about time Instagram joined the social media punishment race.