Shadowban on TikTok: Causes and Solutions

TikTok is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world, but due to its strict moderation algorithms that monitor everything you do on the platform—from the quality and content of your videos to how you interact with your audience through comments and other activities—you always need to follow the rules to stay ahead.

You’ve probably found yourself in a situation where your content is top-notch: your videos are funny, attention-grabbing, and well-edited with carefully selected music, but suddenly your reach and engagement drop. Your videos stop appearing on the For You Page (FYP), likes and comments dwindle, and new followers seem to have disappeared. This is not a coincidence or a glitch. Most likely, your account has been shadowbanned.

What is a Shadowban?

A shadowban is a restriction on your content’s visibility without any official notification. TikTok limits your videos’ reach to a wider audience, making them almost invisible, even to your followers. This can happen due to violations of the platform’s rules, including suspicious activities like follower boosting. TikTok's algorithms know that no human can follow hundreds of accounts in a matter of seconds.

How to Tell if You’re Shadowbanned

1. Decline in Reach: The number of views on your videos drops sharply, even if your videos were consistently popular with high engagement before.
2. Drop in Engagement: Since your content no longer reaches its target audience, likes, comments, and shares decrease significantly. One day you’re getting hundreds of thousands of likes, and the next, you barely hit a hundred.
3. Content Disappears from Search: Your videos don’t appear under hashtags or keywords, and they’re not even visible in your followers’ feeds.
4. Fewer Subscriptions: People stop subscribing to your channel simply because they can’t find you or your content.

A shadowban makes it nearly impossible to grow on TikTok. Even if you create high-quality and engaging content, it simply doesn’t reach your audience. If this happens, it’s important to find the cause and fix the situation.

Reasons for a Shadowban on TikTok

TikTok has strict community guidelines. Violating these rules can easily land you in a shadowban, which can be difficult to escape.

18+ Content

Sometimes, a shadowban can occur when your content is flagged as 18+. This happens when TikTok’s algorithms deem a video inappropriate. This category can include not only explicit scenes but also certain words, phrases, or even actions like kissing.

18+ content is shown in recommendations only to users who have enabled access to such videos in their profile settings. However, this setting is disabled by default, and many users don’t even know it can be activated. As a result, the audience for such videos is drastically limited, leading to a significant drop in reach.

Illegal Activities in videos

TikTok strives to create a safe and welcoming environment for its users. The platform strictly filters content that may contain aggression, violence, or any other illegal actions. If such violations are detected by TikTok’s algorithms or moderators, the account is immediately shadowbanned.

Reusing the Same Hashtags

Don’t use the same hashtags under every video. This tactic has long since lost its effectiveness. Moreover, TikTok’s algorithms may interpret this as spam. Instead, use only hashtags that are genuinely relevant to each specific video, and don’t overdo it—limit yourself to a few rather than using ten at a time.

Frequent Reports

If people frequently report your content, TikTok will definitely review it. If any problems or rule violations are found, your videos or even your entire page may be shadowbanned.

Spam Activity

You can also land in a shadowban for leaving comments like “follow for follow.” TikTok’s algorithms quickly detect this kind of spam and ban the offender.

Automation on the Platform

As mentioned before, avoid suspicious activity on your page, like boosting followers and likes. TikTok’s algorithms are excellent at tracking such automation, and you risk not only being shadowbanned but potentially losing your TikTok account altogether.

Deleting Content

TikTok doesn’t appreciate users deleting already published content. If you want to remove a video, simply make it private or archive it. Deleting it outright could inadvertently put you at risk of a shadowban.

Ignoring Copyrights

TikTok strictly enforces intellectual property laws, so if you use copyrighted music in your videos without the creator’s permission, the platform will restrict access to your account by placing you in a shadowban. To avoid this, use audio from TikTok’s library.

How to Make Sure You’re Shadowbanned

If you notice a drop in reach, it doesn’t necessarily mean your TikTok account is shadowbanned. Here’s what you need to do to confirm if your page is indeed banned:

Analyze Your Stats Over the Last Few Months: Start by reviewing your overall statistics. Compare key metrics like views, likes, comments, and follower growth to previous months. If views have drastically dropped and engagement rates have fallen, it may indicate a shadowban. Pay attention to individual video statistics. If certain videos have extremely low views compared to others, they’re likely restricted by the platform. If the growth of new followers has completely stopped and no one is subscribing to your account anymore, this may also signal an issue.

Check if Your Content Appears in Search: Another way to confirm a shadowban is to create a unique hashtag and publish a new video using it. Then, ask a friend to search for the video using that hashtag. If the video doesn’t show up in search results, it’s a sign that your account may be restricted. To be sure, repeat the test with several people and check content visibility across different devices or TikTok’s web version.

How to Get Out of a Shadowban

In this section, I’ll explain what you can do to escape a shadowban. However, it’s important to understand that a shadowban doesn’t have a fixed duration—you might be free of it in 24 hours, or it might last for a month.

Analyze Your Content

Once you’ve confirmed you’re shadowbanned, start by analyzing your content. If you find videos that violate community guidelines:

• The content features copyrighted music.
• The video includes clips from other creators.
• The video uses prohibited hashtags (these are blocked by TikTok due to inappropriate content).

Such videos should be hidden from public view, along with any low-quality videos. But under no circumstances should you delete them, as it could make things worse.

Give Your Account a Break

Avoid any activity on your page for at least two days. Stop posting new content, viewing videos in your feed, liking, and commenting. If the shadowban wasn’t caused by serious violations, sometimes such a “break” is enough to lift the restriction.

Maintain Quality Activity

After the pause, start posting high-quality content. Always monitor the quality and message of your videos. Participate in trends by using viral audio to boost your visibility. The platform needs to see that you’re actively engaged without breaking any rules.

If you believe the videos you hid aren’t the cause of the shadowban and want to make them public again, try posting them on a “backup” account first. If they show up in search results and aren’t blocked, you can try republishing them on your main page.

Preventing a Shadowban

To avoid getting shadowbanned, follow a few simple rules:

1. Follow TikTok’s Guidelines

This might seem obvious, but many ignore it. Don’t post anything that violates community rules: no violence, spam, or provocative content. Even something minor could cause problems.

2. Create Great Content

TikTok loves and promotes original, high-quality videos. Poor visuals or boring content won’t perform well. Use proper lighting, plan your ideas, and don’t blatantly copy others. The better and more unique your content looks, the more success you’ll have.

3. Use Proxies and Anti-Detect Browsers

If you’re managing multiple accounts (yes, I’m talking about multi-accounting), you can’t do it without “magic” tools. Use an anti-detect browser like Undetectable.io to create separate profiles with unique settings for each account. Don’t forget proxies (e.g., quality residential proxies from the US)—use a unique IP address for each TikTok account to avoid suspicion.

4. Optimize Your Promotion Strategies

Use popular hashtags, but only those relevant to your content. Participate in trends, respond to comments—TikTok’s algorithms love that. And most importantly, keep viewers engaged as long as possible. Audience retention shows the platform that people enjoy your content, and it will definitely avoid blocking you.

Effective Promotion Strategies

In this section, I’ll briefly describe steps for more active promotion on TikTok. If you want to dive deeper into the topic, check this out.

• Creating Original Content: TikTok values creativity, so try to make unique videos that stand out.
• Engaging Your Audience: Interact with followers through comments, answers, or live streams. The more engagement, the better your chances of appearing in recommendations.
• Using Trends: Keep an eye on popular audio, hashtags, and challenges. They help boost reach.
• Multi-Account Management: Divide your audience by interests. For example, dedicate one account to entertainment and another to educational content. This allows you to test different strategies and improve efficiency.

In Conclusion

A shadowban on TikTok is a temporary issue, but it can significantly affect your account’s growth and development. To avoid restrictions, it’s crucial to follow community guidelines, analyze your content, and improve its quality.

If you’re managing multiple accounts, using anti-detect browsers and proxies is essential for successful promotion. Now that you know how to identify a shadowban and get out of it, it’s time to put this knowledge into practice. Good luck!