What Happens When You Accidentally Like—Then Unlike—Someone’s Instagram Post?

(SPOT.ph) We’ve all done a little harmless Instagram stalking. Maybe you’re vibe checking someone you just met or revisiting your ex’s new partner’s profile for the fifth time that week—we don’t judge here. Then, as you’re scrolling, your thumb slips. The heart turns red on a post from 2018.

You unlike it immediately, maybe even block them for good measure. But the real question remains: Did the notification already go through?

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According to Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri, liking a post can generate two separate alerts: one inside Instagram and another as a push notification on the person’s phone. Unliking the post can remove the notification from inside Instagram—but it won't erase the alert already sent to the other person’s phone.

“When you unlike that photo, we can delete that Instagram notification, but we cannot delete that phone notification. It will still say on their lock screen, ‘Adam liked your photo,’ but if they tap on it, there’s no record of it anywhere in the app, so it might be a little confusing,” Mosseri explained in a recent video.

This is because anything that happens outside the app is already out of Instagram’s control.

That does not necessarily mean they saw it. They may have push notifications turned off, missed the alert, or cleared their notifications without reading them. Unfortunately, there is no way to know for sure.

“If we could delete that phone notification, we would, but we can’t,” Mosseri said. “Just make sure as you’re scrolling through someone’s content from many, many years ago, that you’re careful not to like anything by mistake.”

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