Does Hiding Likes on Instagram Affect Engagement?

Instagram hasn't published any data showing that hiding likes raises or lowers engagement. When it made the option available to everyone in May 2021, Instagram said its tests got mixed feedback. Some people found hidden counts helped, and others found them annoying because they use counts to see what's popular.

Hiding likes is a display setting with two parts:

• On your own posts, it stops other people seeing how many likes you got.
• In your feed, it hides the counts on posts you see.

Either way, people can still like, comment and share.

So if engagement drops after you hide likes, check the usual causes first: when you post, which formats you use and what you ask people to do. Then open Insights and compare reach, likes, comments and shares for the four weeks before and after the change. If reach fell too, fewer people saw your posts, and hidden counts probably aren't the cause.