Shadowban Check
Shadowban Check
Shadowban Check is a free page on this site, not an API endpoint, so it does not change the endpoint count. Type a username, press Check, and five rows fill in one at a time. No login, no API key, no credits, and nothing is stored.
The five rows
from:<handle> search, read by three readers| Row | What is read | What counts as a ban |
|---|---|---|
| Search suggestion | X’s own suggestion list for that exact name | The account is not in it. Other names coming back makes the evidence stronger, not weaker: it rules out the index simply being empty for that string. |
| Search | A from:<handle> search, read by three readers | The majority see nothing while the account has posted in the last 45 days. An account that has not posted is reported as "nothing for search to return", never as banned. |
| Ghost ban | Replies the account wrote inside other people’s conversations, opened as a stranger would | The replies are not in the conversation and not behind a low-quality link either. Replies inside the account’s own threads are skipped, because those are always visible. |
| Reply deboosting | X’s own "Show probable spam" section of the same conversation | The reply is found behind that link. X is hiding the reply, not the account, which is a different finding and gets its own row. |
| Reach | Median views of recent original posts as a share of followers, against accounts of the same size and against the account’s own earlier posts | Nothing. Reach is a reading, not a ban: an account can be clear on all four and still reach far fewer people than others its size. |
Reading a verdict
| Badge | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Not banned | The check ran and found nothing against the account. |
| Banned | The check found the limit it looks for. |
| Not certain | The readers disagreed, or the evidence is real but incomplete. |
| Could not check | The read did not happen or did not settle. This is NOT a pass. |
The summary stamp across the top says the same for the account as a whole: All clear, Restricted, Not certain, Partly checked or No answer. A suspended account, a protected (locked) account and a handle that no longer exists are each refused outright with the reason, because none of the four checks mean anything for them.
Why two checks can disagree
X does not answer identically to every session. Measured on one search-banned account on 19 Oct 2026, 1 reader in 24 still returned its 20 posts while 23 saw nothing; the healthy control returned posts 8 times out of 8. A single hit is therefore not proof an account is findable, so the search row takes a majority of three reads and prints the split when the vote was close. If two checks a few minutes apart still disagree, the honest reading is that the account sits near the line.
Limits
Two checks a minute per visitor, so the reader pool stays usable for everyone. A result is reused for 60 seconds, so a link doing the rounds costs one check rather than one per visitor. A run takes roughly 10 to 25 seconds, mostly depending on how much the account posts: the reach reading needs six posts older than 24 hours, and an account posting all day makes that a long walk.