Soft Block
Removing someone as a follower without permanently preventing them from viewing or following again.
“She soft-blocked her coworker so he would stop seeing every personal post.”
A soft block creates distance with less finality than a full block and may be used to quietly remove mutual following.
The practice became common on platforms where blocking and immediately unblocking forced another user to unfollow; some platforms later added direct follower-removal tools.
softblock
The same term written as one word.
remove follower
A platform feature that often achieves the same result.
block-unblock
The older method used to force an unfollow.
Will someone know they were soft-blocked?
Platforms usually do not send a notification, but the person may notice they no longer follow you.
Can they follow again?
Yes, unless the account is private and you decline the request or later block them.