As many Instagram users may have noticed by now, Instagram has recently made it possible to hide like count on posts, both for your posts and for others. This means you can make it so you don’t see how many likes other users have gotten, and you can hide your Instagram likes so that others (and yourself) do not see how many likes your photo has garnered. At first, I thought this idea was, to be blunt, stupid. After all, was that not the point of Instagram? To post a picture of your ‘perfect’ life (though we know social media does not often accurately portray people’s lives) and gather as many comments and likes as possible?
Well, after being encouraged by some friends to hide like counts, I decided to do it as a social experiment. One day in early June, I went into Instagram settings and made it so I could not see others’ like counts and they could not see mine. Originally, I intended to turn them back on at the end of the summer, because, as I thought before, the idea seemed stupid. I did not expect to like turning off likes. But guess what? I did. Let me explain some of the benefits:
You can’t compare the number of likes someone else got with your own. Admit it, there has been a time where you grew slightly envious when your friend got a hundred more likes than you on a similar post. Or when some random person who has significantly fewer followers but still manages to get more likes. You have that momentary feeling of “Do people just not like me?” or “Am I ugly in this photo?” Don’t get me wrong, the self-deprecating thoughts only last a minute, but they still happen. By turning off like counts, you psychically cannot compare yourself to someone else.
You feel more freedom to post what you want, not what you think will get the most likes. This summer, I chose to post some pictures I normally wouldn’t. I did not choose the picture I looked ‘best’ in (the photos that would get more likes), but instead the photo where I looked genuinely happy, the photo I looked at and thought how much fun I was having then.
Instagram is overall a more friendly place. Without the feeling of competition to get the most likes, or the fear of not getting enough, you can enjoy social media for what it should be about: sharing happy (or in some cases, sharing important messages) moments in your life and seeing your friends’ happy moments. Closing the Instagram app shouldn’t leave you feeling bad about yourself.
So, after conducting this little social experiment, I have come to the conclusion that hiding like counts can be beneficial. Obviously, everyone views social media in different ways, and if you like seeing likes, go for it. But if you are looking to increase your social media happiness, I 10/10 recommend turning off your like counts.