How To Claim An Inactive Instagram Username Account
If you’re setting up an Instagram account and have thought of the perfect username that reflects your individuality or mission, you may realize that the username is taken by an inactive account. For companies and influencers trying to jumpstart an Instagram presence, having the right username is valuable.
An inactive account is one that was abandoned or hasn’t been used for a long time. If the account has the username that you so desperately need there’s no direct way to obtain it. But there are several things you can do.
Buying an Instagram Username
There are numerous secondary markets where holders of good usernames can sell them for sums ranging from a few hundred dollars all the way into the tens of thousands.
For the most part, the people making money selling names are those who staked out their accounts in the early days and had the foresight to pick names that other users would eventually want.
Sometimes a name becomes valuable because a movie or show or album comes out, and suddenly ‘BigBangTheory’ goes from being a great account for a physics student to being a highly sought-after property. If the account becomes “inactive,” you may be able to get the username.
Finding Their Contact Information
Just because the account is inactive doesn’t mean that the owner of the account isn’t around. It may be that they would be perfectly happy to sell you their old account. However, getting in touch with them may be the tricky part.
Of course, you can send a Direct Message on the Instagram platform itself. Though, if the person isn’t active on Instagram, there’s a good chance that they won’t see your DM for quite some time if they even see it at all.
You can check the bio of the account to try and get information about the account. There are a few things to look for here.
Some people actually put a contact e-mail address in their bio or even their personal website’s URL. If that’s the case, your quest is probably already successful.
Other people are more privacy-minded and don’t put that kind of direct contact information there. However, they may include links or references to their other social media accounts, such as their Facebook page or their LinkedIn bio. If you have this person’s name; you can always search through other social media sites and send them a message there.
If you have no idea how much to offer, you might look up similar accounts at Instagram account market sites like InstaSale and see what comparable accounts are being listed for.
Can You Get an Inactive Instagram Username?
Instagram will purge inactive users eventually. This offers another way to get your username.
Will Instagram Delete Inactive Accounts?
Yes, they will delete inactive accounts, although the time that it takes for them to do that varies depending on the website’s needs.
For example, purges usually happen at random, or at least, they seem random. Often these purges occur at the end of the year.
Wait for an Instagram Purge
If the account you want is genuinely inactive and doesn’t have much or any content on it, then there is an excellent chance that it will eventually be purged from the Instagram database. It’s no guarantee, but it’s possible that the inactive account you want will be dropped, and the username will become available again.
Instagram does not announce the schedule for its purges, so you won’t get a heads up to alert you to start trying to grab any usernames on your list. The best way to detect a purge is to follow one of the perennially-popular Instagram accounts that has a relatively stable follower’s list and check their follower count daily.
If they have thousands of followers, then at least some of those followers are undoubtedly spam accounts or bots, and a purge is going to cut their follower list by some non-trivial quantity of users. If your monitored account goes from 9,341 followers to 9,102 followers overnight (and there’s not some apparent scandalous post driving the loss), the odds are good that Instagram did a purge, and some usernames are now up for grabs.
Trademark or Copyright the Name
You can go through the process of getting a patent online. Once the patent is obtained you can report the inactive account to Instagram. Although this may take time and an additional expense this is an option for you.
Many users have reported success by asking Instagram to transfer an account. When you hold a trademark on a name you can argue that the existing account is causing confusion for your customers. Copyright infringement can be an effective way to obtain your Instagram username.
If you hold such a trademark or copyright, you can file a copyright/trademark violation report and attempt to claim the name as your own.
If the account is active and frequently used you may have difficulty succeeding with this method.
Getting a new trademark is a complicated and expensive process, but getting a copyright is reasonably straightforward. Any time you create anything original, you have implicit copyright; you can file an official copyright registration to cement your legal claim, but the claim is created by the act of creating the work, not by the act of filing the claim.
Choose a Similar Name
Although this may seem obvious, choosing a username that is similar is the simplest way to set up your Instagram account. Adding an underscore or a number is simple and effective.
Instagram usernames can be up to 30 characters long, and can contain letters, numbers, periods, and underscores. This gives you quite a bit of flexibility in creating a name that is close to the name of your dreams. You may need to use a little imagination, but the rest should be straightforward enough.
If you run a business, add a city or location to your name. You can do the same for surnames or other names too. This can help maintain your brand and add a quick local identifier that may work in your favor. You can also add the type of business to the name.
Workarounds For Larger Brands
If you’re a larger business or more established brand, adding ‘official’ or ‘real’ at the end of your Instagram account name can work too. Artists with common names often do this so you can too.
You do need to be careful about emulating established brands, however. If you create an account for Microsoft Software, it’s a legal account name – but if you reach a level of success and visibility where Microsoft sees your account, they will shut you down promptly using the same trademark and copyright tools I described above. You can’t infringe on other people’s protected intellectual property just as much as they can’t intrude on yours.
If you’re having trouble obtaining a username but there are no accounts with that username remember that some accounts are set to private. If this is the case; the username will be unavailable and you won’t be able to search for the account.
Created Account But Can’t log in
Several users have reported that they’ve created a new Instagram account with the perfect username and receive the “Sorry, Something Went Wrong” error message. Clicking the ‘Try Again’ option or trying to log in doesn’t work. Unfortunately, the username is now taken and you can’t log in. So what are you to do if this has happened?
You can contact Instagram Support, which may or may not be helpful. If you have screenshots of the error message or username, that would be great.
Try using a different application or web browser to log into your new Instagram account. This could be a simple glitch with the application.
Log in with Facebook and see if your new account shows. Assuming you used similar login credentials, the new account may appear.
Wait for a few hours, then try to log back into your Instagram account.
This can be incredibly frustrating when you’ve created the perfect Instagram username and can’t access the account. Trying the tips we’ve outlined may help you to gain access to the account you’ve created.
Does Instagram delete inactive users?
Yes, but after some time. Although we don’t know the exact process Instagram does state that it’s important to log into your account to avoid a purge, the company does not give time frames for when an account will be purged.
What can I do if I need help with my Instagram account or username?
Instagram does have a help website that you can visit to get help with a variety of things. If you can’t access your account or if someone is accessing your account unlawfully, visit the Instagram Help Center for help.
How long does it take for a username to become available after someone deletes their account?
Instagram has not given us the official word on this, but many users have reported they were able to take the name as soon as the original owner deleted their account.
Keep in mind, the account will need to be permanently deleted. If you’re trying to buy a username from another user, be sure you’ve obtained the username before sending payment.
Leave a Reply