A Complete List Of Banned Hashtags You Should Avoid

Banned Hastags: Hashtags on Instagram are very essential to grow the reach of your content and gain more followers for your account. Utilizing a guide to using Instagram hashtags will surely help you increase the reach of your account.

But there are a number of banned hashtags on Instagram that you should keep an eye on and avoid using them. Using these hashtags will always bring a negative impact on your Instagram growth.

You should know what happens when you use a banned hashtag and how to avoid using it along with the complete list of banned hashtags. We’ll explain and show you everything you need to know about them here.

But before that, let’s first learn what a banned hashtag really means.

What are banned hashtags?

Banned hashtags are the hashtags that Instagram has decided to remove from usage for Instagram users.

The posts with Instagram-banned hashtags remain hidden from the viewers. However, if you use these banned hashtags on your posts, it may affect the overall organic reach of your account and its growth too.

These hashtags are mostly reported by users because they don’t meet Instagram’s community guidelines. As more users start reporting a post with the same hashtag, Instagram will investigate on why it’s getting reported often.

Then, if Instagram decides that the content with the particular hashtag may be harmful to the user end point safety, the hashtag is banned.

There are many banned hashtags on Instagram but they are not officially listed by Instagram. That is why we will be listing them in this post.

But let’s look at why Instagram really bans these hashtags first and why you must pay attention while posting your content with them.

Why does Instagram ban hashtags?

Instagram usually bans hashtags that are used for posting inappropriate content or certain hashtags that use spammy content.

The inappropriate content usually includes adult content and similar kinds of stuff.

Whereas, the remaining other hashtags are used by spam accounts or fake accounts by using too many hashtags with irrelevant content. They may be used by bots to increase the spam content on Instagram as well.

In the following list, you may also see some innocent hashtags that may not be considered for inappropriate use or spam content by bots. But still, the hashtag is banned and it’s for a similar reason.

Let us consider the hashtag usage of #kansas. Even though Kansas is just a name of the state or a city in the United State, this is one of the banned Instagram hashtags.

If you search for it on your Instagram explore page, it will show you the message that says “Recent posts for #kansas are hidden because some posts may not follow Instagram’s Community Guidelines”.

not following community guidelines

This is because one or more accounts used this particular hashtag to post inappropriate or not safe for work (NSFW) content as spam. Then, it was reported by a lot of users, which resulted in it being banned by Instagram.

However, the hashtag #kansascity is still one of the approved hashtags on Instagram if you want to add a post related to Kansas City.

kansas city hashtag

It’s a similar case with the hashtag #hardworkpaysoff too. Instagram considers this hashtag as a banned hashtag.

hardworkpaysoff hashtag page

But if you add an emoji and search the hashtag as #hardworkpaysoff💪, there is no issue of it being a banned hashtag.

Although, some extremely offensive hashtags like #sexworker may be completely hidden on the search page as well.

completely banned hashtag number 1

When there are a lot of community reports regarding a hashtag, Instagram investigates the hashtag. And if there are any violations of Instagram’s rules from them after Instagram’s investigations, they’ll ban the hashtags.

Some of the other reasons why Instagram bans hashtags are if the posts associated with the hashtags promote hate speech, organized crime, self-harm, sexual services, and so on.

For example, the tag #selfharm itself is considered one of the banned Instagram hashtags. But it’s a bit different than the other banned hashtags.

If you look up the #selfharm hashtag, it will ask you whether you want to contact the support even though you can choose to see the results anyway. This is because self-harm is a very sensitive incident and the people searching for this term may be in need of professional help.

completely banned hashtag 2

Similarly, any type of slang or vulgar words is also listed under the Instagram-banned hashtags. This is done for very obvious reasons as it may lead to many further sensitive content that might not be appropriate for the good image of the internet and Instagram.

Now that you have a brief idea of why Instagram bans hashtags, let’s now have a look at all the banned Instagram hashtags.

The List of Banned Instagram Hashtags from A-Z

There are many banned Instagram hashtags that you should avoid using. So, we’ll be listing them alphabetically below.

A

#abc7ny
#abcess
#abdl
#addmysc
#adultlife
#adulting
#agariogaming
#afourchamberedheart
#africanexpeditions
#akiralane
#allbreasts
#alone
#always
#amearalavey
#americangirl
#armparty
#asia
#asiangirl
#assday
#ass
#assworship
#attractive
#audaciousprayer

B

#babe
#babyrp
#bacak
#bbc
#beautyblogger (#beautybloggers works.)
#beautydirectory
#besties
#beyonce
#bikinibody
#boho
#books
#brain

C

#costumes
#cpr
#curvy
#curvygirls
#customers

D

#direct
#dating
#dm
#date
#dadylove
#desk
#dogsofinstagram

E

#easter
#edm
#eggplant
#eggplantparm
#elevator

F

#fishnets
#fitnessgirls
#followforfollow

G

#girlsonly
#goddess
#gloves
#graffitiigers

H

#happythanksgiving
#hardworkpaysoff (#hardworkpaysoff💪 is ok.)
#hawks
#hotweather
#humpday
#hustler

I

#ice
#ig
#ilovemyinstagram
#instababy
#instamood
#instasport
#iphonegraphy
#italiano

K

#kansas (#kansascity works.)
#kickoff
#killingit
#kissing

L

#l4l
#lean
#leaves
#like
#likeback
#likeforlike
#lingerie
#livinforalivin
#loseweight
#lulu
#lust

M

#master
#mileycyrus
#milf
#mirrorphoto
#models
#mustfollow

N

#nasty
#newyears
#newyearsday
#nudes
#nudity

O

#orderweedonline
#outdoorbirth
#overnight

P

#parties
#petite
#popular
#pornfood
#prettygirl
#publicrelations
#puppydogmondays
#pushups

R

#rate
#ravens

S

#saltwater
#samelove
#selfharm
#sexworker
#shower
#single
#singlelife
#skateboarding
#skype
#snap
#snapchat
#snowstorm
#sopretty
#stranger
#streetphoto
#stud
#sunbathing
#swole

T

#tag4like
#tagsforlikes
#tanlines
#teens
#teen
#tgif
#thought
#todayimwearing
#treasurethesemoments

U

#underage
#undies

V

#valentinesday

W

#woman
#womancrushwednesday
#women
#workflow
#wtf

Y

#youngmodel

What happens if I use a banned hashtag?

If you use one of these Instagram-banned hashtags for your posts, your posts won’t be shown to your audience. But they can still see your post with the banned hashtag if they open your profile or a post link.

Instagram users can also see your post with the banned hashtags if they scroll through the search page results from the explore tab. When they search for the hashtag on the search bar, some posts might appear.

However, you will get a similar message just above the top posts of the search results.

Note: For some banned hashtags like #snapchat, they won’t show it to you even if you want to post a new post.

snapchat hashtag is banned on instagram

Alternatively, if you use too many banned hashtags, your account may be shadow banned. Shadow banning isn’t a new concept in social media and your Instagram account may go through it too if you are using banned hashtags.

The Instagram shadowban works the same as any other shadowban on the internet. Instagram will block the content of your account so that potential followers won’t be able to find your content.

As a result, you won’t be gaining any new followers as the Instagram shadowban will prevent showing your content to other users except your followers. This can really hurt your Instagram growth as there won’t be any genuine audience for your content except maybe some bot accounts.

If you continue sharing content by using banned hashtags for multiple posts, Instagram’s algorithm may also detect it and can punish you further. This may also lead to a permanent account ban on your Instagram profile.

How to Avoid Banned Hashtags

Since using banned hashtags may lead to a permanent ban on your Instagram account, it’s very important that you should avoid using these hashtags.

stop using banned hashtags

Thankfully, there are some very easy and quick tips to avoid using these banned Instagram hashtags.

You should always use accurate hashtags on your posts when you post them. Avoid using irrelevant hashtags on your post since relevancy is also something that the Instagram algorithm looks for.
Use generic hashtags that are directly related to the post. This can also help Instagram to identify and categorize your posts accordingly and show them to the relevant audiences.
Before you add any hashtags to your post, search the hashtag in advance to make sure that they aren’t one of the banned hashtags. Make sure that they aren’t used by many bot accounts too.
Similarly, if you find any content with hashtags that seem like spam content, keep a close eye on posts like these as well. These hashtags may also get reported in a few days or months by the Instagram community and get banned.
Avoid using the same hashtags for a single post. If the same hashtag is used repeatedly for a post, your content may be flagged by Instagram too.
They may investigate the post and the hashtags used on them to check if you’re using a banned hashtag.
So find close alternatives for the hashtag and use just the relevant set of hashtags for one post. Just don’t repeat the same hashtags again and again when you upload a post.
Always be updated with the banned list of Instagram hashtags. You can also regularly check our list of banned Instagram hashtags regularly or other similar articles.
You can also find a lot of helpful information by searching about them on the internet. You can usually find many news articles as soon as a hashtag is banned on Instagram.

Banned Hashtags on Instagram

Using banned Instagram hashtags is never good for your account and posts. If you use them on the posts of your account, your content won’t be shown to most of your Instagram audience.

But if you further keep on posting multiple banned Instagram hashtags, your account can even go through shadowban or a permanent ban. That is why we’ve provided this list of banned Instagram hashtags that you should avoid using.

We’ve also mentioned some quick tips to help you identify and avoid using a banned Instagram hashtag. If combined with a wise strategy to Buy Instagram Followers these points will surely help you to grow the reach of your Instagram presence by using proper hashtags.

And since hashtag marketing is very effective on Instagram, it’s really important that you use it correctly.