Today, Zwift enabled a new privacy feature so you can block other Zwifters and thus limit their ability to interact with you and your data.
How To Block Another Zwifter
To block a Zwifter, you’ll need to use the Zwift Companion app for iOS and Android. Look up the Zwifter’s profile Companion (More>Find Zwifters is one way, but there are others). Tap their name to access their profile page, then tap the 3-dot menu at the top-right and tap “Block User” then tap it again to confirm. You’ll see a confirmation message whenever you visit their profile:
You can easily unblock anyone you’ve blocked by following the basic instructions above: look up their profile, tap the 3-dot menu, then tap “Unblock User”.
What Does Blocking Do?
When you block another Zwifter, they cannot:
- Send you direct messages in game/via Companion
- Follow your profile (which means they will never see you listed on the “Join a Zwifter” feature)
- View your activity history in Zwift
Even though you block a user, they can still:
- See you in game if riding nearby
- See your name listed in race results (since those are public)
- Look up your profile using the Companion app (but they cannot see your profile details). They will see a basic profile screen with your name, profile image, and country, plus the message “This user is private. You must request to follow them before you can see their full profile.” (As far as I can see, if the Zwifter attempts to follow you from this screen, the attempt is essentially ignored by Zwift. Which is good.)
Read more about blocking at support.zwift.com…
Questions or Comments?
Want to test the new blocking feature? Search on “insider” and block any of Zwift Insider’s bot accounts. You won’t hurt their feelings.
If you have any thoughts about this new feature or questions about how it works, go ahead and comment below.
If I block someone, can I still see their public messages in chat? (I’ve wanted to block or mute someone who’s way too chatty during a ride more than once.)
I hope so, it would be useful for silencing spam bots which seem to be prevalent lately
From the Blocking FAQ support page:
“if you’re riding near a member you’ve blocked you can see any messages they send to the general chat in-game. They’ll also be able to see any messages you send to the general chat in-game.”
Well that sucks. The spam bots are getting worse so there needs to be a way for us to block them or Zwift need to do some technical trickery to identify and suppress the bot messages..
The spam bots in the last week or so have been terrible. Just being able to mute them would be a start, or report spam.
Good news is that they’ve said the Blocking feature will continue to evolve. Bad news is that they’ve told us in the past that features will continue to evolve and…
I gave a thumbs down to the settings, not to you specifically, Tom.
Whilst I’m very happy to see this Block option, I wish it would extend to the in game chat as well.
Some folks are so annoying that I have to leave an enjoyable ride and go elsewhere.
Reading the FAQ you will still see their chat which is a good thing as they may be pointing out a pot hole or some obstruction you need to know about.
i tried in 3.60.1 companion. after blocked someone, he/she can’t see follow button in my profile.
Search users function still there is follow button, after tap follow button would notice “can’t follow this user”
not like what u “the attempt is essentially ignored by Zwift”
it had better set urself in private to some users u don’t like, rather that block them
block = a very unfriendly option, it’ll just piss someone off.
so i think this option is not perfect
what are spam bots? never seen or heard of it before.
See https://forums.zwift.com/t/bot-riding-and-spamming-the-chat/633240 for an example.
I’ve experienced it a few times.
Usually an Asian flagged user, name is just a gobbledegook of letters, numbers and characters and every few seconds, they post a message of random characters.
If you go to view the user, they aren’t pedalling but are managing to hold 40kph, with zero effort.
It gets very annoying and tiresome.
Zwift could not have gotten this more backwards. I don’t care who follows me on the platform; I just want to selectively block in-game chat. Zwift left out the most important part.
It’s quite possible you aren’t the target market for this feature.
Quite likely, it seems, but I would have expected that the people who need the things Zwift actually added would have also wanted to hide the chat.
Perhaps, and that might come in a later iteration. For now, I think this first version is about blocking people who are sending threatening (or otherwise unwanted) private messages. Those same people probably won’t send those sorts of messages via public chat, so I think it’s at least a good first step.
Nailed it, Eric. As a person who Zwifts while female and has unfortunately encountered situations where blocking a user is warranted… this is a very welcome feature.
I’m glad they’re finally part way implementing this but …yeah the still being able to see the person in-world and therefore send public chats is still a problem, from experience.
Would the blocked user still be notified whenever I start zwifting? That was the most bothering thing.
This is happening to me. The blocked user knows every time I start Zwifting. How do I stop this?
I’d say reach out to Zwift support to confirm what’s going on.
The blocking support article link is dead. I believe it should be https://support.zwift.com/blocking-another-member-S1IMkzOtC
Fixed, thanks!