Fake Followers Check
Last reviewed: January 2026
How to check for fake Instagram followers and document audience quality.
What counts as a fake follower?
There isn't one single definition. In practice, brands and agencies use "fake followers" as shorthand for low-quality or inorganic accounts that inflate follower counts without driving real engagement.
That can include bots, purchased followers, and mass-follow/unfollow accounts that churn quickly.
Common signals
Look for follower spikes that don't match engagement, unnatural growth bursts, and repeated patterns in account quality (no posts, generic usernames, and thin profiles).
No single signal is perfect. Strong audits combine multiple signals and look at changes over time.
How Heroic Signal™ helps
Upload your Instagram data export to generate a durable audience audit: unfollow timelines, engagement totals, comment analysis, and suspicious burst flags.
When you want to share proof, you can generate a public-facing verification badge for partners.
Run an audience audit in minutes
Create an account, upload your Instagram export, and generate clean reporting: unfollow timelines, engagement totals, burst flags, and a shareable verification badge.