If you just started to use Twitch, you will get various recommendations of channels from Twitch. So, you started to watch the recommended stream. After a while, you felt like you have a connection with the streamer and wanted to support him. Following a channel is a good way to support a streamer if you can’t afford to buy a channel subscription yet.
How To Follow a Channel on Twitch
To follow a channel on Twitch, log in to your Twitch account first. You need to have a Twitch account to follow and subscribe to a channel. Open the stream of the channel you wanted to follow or open the channel link. Scroll down, below the video player click the purple “Follow” heart button.
If you follow a channel on Twitch, you will get a notification for every future stream by the followed channel. Keep in mind that the streamer will know when you follow their channel and your username will be listed on their Followers List
After clicking the follow button, the button will be replaced by gray heart emoji, indicating that you have followed the channel. Besides the heart emoji, there is a bell button signifying the notification setting of the channel
There is no requirement to allow you to follow a channel. What you only need is a Twitch account. You can’t follow a channel as a guest
How To Check the Channel you followed on Twitch
To view the channel, you have followed on Twitch, head to the left sidebar. You can see the followed channel, in my case, I follow the xQcOW channel. Opening your twitch profile can also let you to view the channel you follow
You can also check by opening your twitch profile:
- Clicking your Twitch username at the top right
- From the menu, choose “Channel” to open your channel
- Click “Following” under the video player
How to Turn Off Followed Channel Notification
After you follow a channel, you can turn off the notification setting easily. Just click the bell button beside the heart emoji. Clicking the bell will toggle off the notification setting. It’s better to only toggle on the bell on only a few channels you really like to get notification from
You can easily check the notification by clicking the notification tab at the top right of the screen, beside the whisper tab and your profile image.
How To Follow a Channel on Android/iOS Twitch Mobile App
- Open Your Twitch Mobile App
- Log in to your Twitch Account. You can only use Twitch Mobile App with logged Twitch account
- Go to the stream of a channel you would like to follow
- Minify the video player, and scroll down below the video player
- Click the Purple “Follow” Hearth Button
How To Unfollow a Channel on Twitch
To unfollow a channel on Twitch, make sure you already followed the channel. Open the channel page or their stream page. Below the video player, you can see the gray heart button. Hovering to the heart button will turn the color to red and show the “unfollow” tooltip. Click the button to unfollow the channel
Unfollowing a channel will stop the notification you get from the channel. If you just wanted to stop the notification spam, you can turn off the notification setting in the guide above. No need to unfollow the channel
You can follow the channel again after unfollow. A Twitch user unfollowing a channel is a rare thing that happens. Most Twitch Users just let the number of the followed channel grew even if the streamer already stops streaming.
Is It Okay To Get Unfollowed on your Twitch Channel?
If you get unfollowed, there is no need to panic. It’s normal to get unfollowed once in a while. Getting unfollowed won’t bring you repercussions. According to Twitch Channel Moderation, Twitch won’t punish a channel that gets unfollowed, even if you get sudden mass unfollow on your channel.
Mass Unfollow rarely happens. A sudden decrease in the following count happens because Twitch periodically removes batches of follower bots on all channels. Even then, Twitch won’t ban you from this situation. Twitch can’t know if you are the one who uses the follow bot or not.
Sometimes Twitch massively ban millions of follower bot, this can make the number of follows in your channel decrease. Since it’s only a fake follower, it won’t cause harm to your Twitch stream account.
How to Unfollow a Channel on Android/iOS Twitch Mobile App
To Unfollow a channel on Twitch Mobile App, log into your account first. Open the stream or channel page that you want to unfollow. Below the video player, there is a follow heart button. Click the button to unfollow. There will be a pop-up to ask if you want to unfollow the channel. Click Yes and the button will be grey, signifying you have already unfollowed the channel
Why You Should Follow your favorite Streamer’s Channel
Following a channel let you get a notification for every future stream on the followed channel. Some channel only allows channel follower on their chat room. Following your favorite streamer channel can also support them to become Twitch Affiliate and Twitch Partner. Not only that, following, unlike subscribing, is free.
Twitch let you use the following feature on all Twitch channel, as long you have Twitch account logged in. You may ask, what is the benefit of following a channel?
What is the benefit of following a channel?
Following will benefit both the viewers and the streamers. For the viewers, the following can let you organize the list of your favorite streamers, and if you want, get a notification. For streamers, followers are one of the requirements to upgrade your streamer’s status on Twitch. The number of followers is a good indicator of how popular the streamer is
We all busy in real life, most of us only open Twitch in a free time from work or the weekend. By following a channel, you don’t need to search a channel every time you open Twitch. You can also check the list of the channel you followed if you want to watch the channel you had forgot to watch
Not only that, Twitch will use the data of the channel you followed and viewed to give you good stream recommendation on your Twitch homepage
Some channels usually need extra permission to talk in chat. Some channels need you to follow them before you can use the chat feature. Of course, this is rare, since most channel either allow all Twitch user or only subscriber to chat
Following a channel is a good way to support a small streamer that has just started. Usually, for a small streamer, most of them haven’t become Twitch Affiliate yet. Only Twitch Affiliate and Twitch Partner can get donations and subscriptions. What viewers can only do to small streamers is only watching, engaging on the chat, and following. Following will bring massive help to small streamers.
Don’t forget that following is free. You don’t need to pay to follow a channel. So, if you can’t afford to subscribe to the channel or the channel hasn’t become Twitch Affiliate, you can follow the channel. It will help them tremendously.
Conclusion
Following a Twitch channel is a good way to support Twitch streamers. It’s free, so you don’t need to pay to follow a channel. Unlike subscribing, you don’t need to pay attention to monthly renewal. If you change your mind, you can unfollow the channel anytime. Unfollowing won’t bring any harm to you as viewer since you can refollow at any time. Getting unfollowed also won’t trigger ban to your channel as a streamer.