4 hours ago - Technology
Clean your feed: Refresh your Instagram diet
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Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios
Welcome back to our mini-series on how to clean up your social media diet.
Instagram, the highly visual platform that once revolved around your friends' espresso drinks and vacation photos, now feels packed with influencers you've never met and recommendations you didn't ask for.
Why it matters: Cleaning up your Instagram account redirects you to content from people and posts you actually care about. It's not about missing out; it's about reclaiming your attention.
Some of your options:
- Quick fix: Switch to the "Following" feed by clicking the Instagram logo at the top of your screen when you open the app. You'll have to toggle to it each time you open the app, but it'll only show you posts from those you follow — the closest you can get to an algorithm-free feed.
- Gradual cleanup: Start tapping the "…" and hitting "Not Interested" whenever you see a garbage post, whether it's fake news, rage bait or influencers. This will slowly declutter your feed.
- Check on what you're engaging with: Go to your profile, tap "Following," then "Least Interacted With." You'll see accounts you haven't engaged with in a while, and you can quickly unfollow from there.
- Try a social experiment: You've probably noticed a growing number of "suggested" posts — content from accounts you don't follow but that Instagram thinks you'll like. You can temporarily turn these off. When a suggested post appears, tap the "…" and select "Snooze Suggested Posts for 30 Days." Then see how it feels to live outside the algorithm for a month.
- Be your own algorithm: For a more extreme reset, switch to the "Favorites" feed by tapping the Instagram logo. Curate a list of just close friends and family whose posts you want to see. Their posts will even appear in chronological order — just like social media used to be.
The bottom line: A few small switches can turn down the noise and bring back the people you actually care about. Start there.
