How can I stop people from seeing I viewed their profile on LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a popular professional networking platform used by millions of people worldwide. When you view someone’s profile on LinkedIn, by default they are notified that you viewed their profile. This can be concerning for some users who want to remain anonymous when looking at profiles. Fortunately, there are a few things you can do to stop people from seeing you viewed their LinkedIn profile.

Why You Might Want Your Views Private

Here are some common reasons why you may want to keep your LinkedIn profile views private:

• You don’t want the other person to know you’re checking them out for research or interest in their work.
• You looked at their profile accidentally or out of casual browsing.
• You want to maintain your professional network without notifying everyone about your browsing behavior.
• You don’t want to trigger a lot of notifications and clutter for the other person.

Whatever your reasons, you can take steps to keep your LinkedIn views anonymous.

Change Your View Settings to Private

The easiest way to make your LinkedIn views private is to change your account settings:

1. Go to your LinkedIn account settings page.
2. Under the Privacy section, find Profile Viewing Options.
3. Uncheck the box next to “Let others know you viewed their profile”.
4. Save your changes.

With this setting changed, your profile views will now be completely anonymous. No one will receive notifications that you visited their profile.

Use Anonymous Mode When Viewing Profiles

You can also view any LinkedIn profile anonymously using LinkedIn’s anonymous browsing feature:

1. Click on the profile picture of the account you want to view.
2. Select “Anonymous mode” from the drop-down menu.
3. This will open the profile in a private browsing mode without recording your visit.

Using anonymous mode is a quick way to check out a profile privately without changing your global account settings. Just remember to enable anonymous browsing each time you want to be anonymous.

Use LinkedIn’s Private Mode

LinkedIn’s private mode lets you browse openly while preventing others from seeing your activity:

1. Click on your profile picture in the top right corner.
2. Select “Private mode”.
3. Browse and search LinkedIn freely without your actions showing up.
4. Exit private mode when you’re done to resume public browsing.

Private mode is perfect for browsing during your lunch break or for research without cluttering someone else’s notifications.

Block the Person You Viewed

If you want to view someone’s full LinkedIn profile anonymously, you can block them which removes you from their viewer list:

1. From their profile, click the “More” menu in the top right.
2. Select “Block”.
3. Confirm the block. You can now view their full profile anonymously.
4. Unblock the person later if needed to reconnect.

Blocking someone just to view their profile anonymously is a bit extreme. Only use this method if you absolutely must view their full profile without them knowing.

Use an Anonymous LinkedIn Account

You can create an entirely separate anonymous LinkedIn account to view profiles. Here’s how:

1. Sign up for a new LinkedIn account with an alternate email.
2. Do not connect anyone you know to this account.
3. Use this account to anonymously view profiles.
4. Log out when done browsing to keep your anonymity.

Having a separate stealth account prevents connections between you and the people you view. But maintaining two accounts can be challenging.

Use the LinkedIn Mobile App

A simple trick is to view profiles using LinkedIn’s mobile app. On the app:

• Profile views are anonymous by default.
• Your name won’t show up in someone’s viewer list.

So the mobile app allows anonymous browsing even if you have your settings on public. The tradeoff is you only see a limited preview of profiles.

Leverage LinkedIn Recruiter

If you have a LinkedIn Recruiter account, you can privately look up and view LinkedIn profiles of potential candidates. Recruiter allows discreet searching without notifying profile owners when you view their profiles.

Use a VPN or Proxy Service

You can mask your IP address and location using a VPN or proxy service when viewing LinkedIn. This prevents LinkedIn from recording your profile views to someone else’s account. However, VPNs and proxies can slow your browsing speed.

Conclusion

Viewing LinkedIn profiles anonymously is possible through your account settings, features like private mode, or using a separate stealth account. Simply toggling your views to private mode is the easiest method. But you can also combine approaches like the mobile app plus anonymous browsing for extra anonymity. In general, always respect other people’s privacy and data as you browse LinkedIn.

In summary, keeping your LinkedIn profile browsing private is easy with the right settings and tools. Adjust your privacy settings, browse anonymously, use private mode, or access profiles from your mobile app to stop your views from being tracked. This will prevent cluttering someone else’s notifications and keep your research discrete.