Straight answers about what Instagram records, what stays private, and who can see what.
Instagram stalker: who can see youWhat a quiet visitor can see, and what Instagram records.Read the guide 
Private Instagram viewerWhat a private account shows, and why no viewer opens the rest.Read the guide The viewer list of a story is the one place a name is kept, for 48 hours. Profile visits and post views are not recorded for the owner.
A private account's content is delivered only to approved followers. No website, app or trick changes that.
A real viewer takes a public username and nothing else. A page that asks for an Instagram login is after your account.
Most of what you do on someone else's account leaves no name on their side. The exceptions are the story viewer list and anything you send.
A photo or video sent in a message as view-once tells the sender when it was opened, and Instagram notifies the sender of a screenshot of it.
Of viewers that Instagram keeps: the story viewer list
How long the owner can read it
How long a story stays up
Apps and sites offer to answer it. The answer follows from what Instagram keeps.
There is no record of profile visits for an owner to read, in the app or anywhere else, so no app can request it.
An app that claims to show profile visitors has no visit data to work from. The accounts it lists come from likes, comments and follows.
A 'who viewed my profile' app that asks for your Instagram password gets access to your account in exchange for a list it cannot verify.
The story viewer list is the only place Instagram names who looked, and only for 48 hours after a story is posted.
Insights on a professional account count profile visits as a number. They never name the visitors.
It asks for your Instagram password, it asks you to pay or fill in a survey before it shows the list, or it promises names that Instagram does not record.
People search for an "Instagram stalker" when they mean looking at an account without being noticed, or when they worry about being looked at. Both come down to the same settings.
Set the account to private, share stories to Close Friends, hide your story from named people, restrict or block an account, and report messages or comments that harass you. All of these are in Instagram's settings.
Look at public content only, and leave it there: no messages, comments or follow requests to someone who has not invited them.
Never follow, message or watch someone from another account after they blocked you.
Never create a fake account to get past a private setting or a block.
When an account worries you, use Instagram's report and block tools.
Instagram has not published how the list is ordered. These answers cover what is known.
Instagram does not record profile visits, and it has not said that they decide the order.
Instagram has not published how the list is ordered, so the position of a name says nothing certain about when that person watched.
No. The list closes 48 hours after the story was posted, whether or not the story was saved to a highlight.
Yes, on a public account: a viewer loads the story without an account. On a private account, or with Close Friends, only the people you approved receive it.
No. Each account appears once, with no count of replays.
Yes. Hide story from, in the story settings, keeps your stories away from the accounts you name, and they are not told.
People read these guides from both sides: looking at accounts, and protecting their own.
Each one is in Instagram's settings, and each one applies to every viewer, every app and every person.
Only followers you approve see your posts, stories, highlights and lists. Everyone else sees your picture, name, bio and counts.
Share a story to a list you choose. People outside the list, and every viewer, never receive it.
Keep your stories away from named accounts without blocking them or making the whole account private.
Restrict hides an account's comments from others; block cuts it off; report sends it to Instagram for review.
Instagram can show the accounts you follow and the people you message when you were last active. Turning activity status off hides yours, and hides theirs from you.
A viewer sees what a logged-out visitor sees. Make the account private, or share a story to Close Friends, and no viewer receives it.
Short answers. Each guide goes deeper.
Type a public username and open the viewer. No Instagram login on your side, no name on theirs.
