How to Turn On Comments on TikTok (and Why It’s Locked)

The setting lives in Profile → ☰ → Settings and privacy → Privacy → Comments, on the “Who can comment on your videos” row, then pick Everyone. If that option is greyed out, the reason is nearly always the same: your account’s birth date says you are under 16, and TikTok locks “Everyone” with no way around it. Videos you already posted carry a second switch, hidden in their own ⋯ menu. Once the section is open, a batch of TikTok comments helps get it started.

Turn comments on for the whole account

This is the master switch. It decides who can write under any of your videos, the old ones as well as the ones you have not filmed yet.

1. Open TikTok and tap Profile, bottom right.
2. Tap the ☰ menu in the top right corner, then Settings and privacy.
3. Under the Account heading, go into Privacy.
4. Scroll down to Comments.
5. On the “Who can comment on your videos” row, choose Everyone.

The change applies straight away and it works backwards too: videos that showed an empty comment section become open again. Three things worth knowing before you go hunting elsewhere.

• “Everyone” only exists on a public account. On a private profile the ceiling is your approved followers. You flip that in Privacy, on the “Private account” row.
• “Nobody” shuts everything at once. It is the only way to switch comments off across the entire account in one move, which the per video setting cannot do.
• If the row is greyed out, stop digging through the menus. The answer is in the age section just below.

@tiffanynailsociety

The whole path, filmed screen by screen. #turnoncomments #tiktoktutorials

♬ original sound – tiffanynailsociety

Turn comments back on for a video you already posted

TikTok keeps two separate switches, and that is what trips most people up. Your account can be set to “Everyone” while one specific video stays shut, because the box was unticked when you uploaded it.

While posting. On the final screen, tap Who can comment (or the cog icon, then Privacy settings) and leave Allow comments switched on. It is ticked by default, but a setting left closed on one video sometimes carries over to the next.

After posting. Open the video from your profile, tap the three dots ⋯ on the right, scroll the row of icons all the way across and go into Privacy settings. Switch Allow comments on. The section reopens immediately, and comments written before you closed it come back: they were hidden, never deleted.

Several videos to reopen. Recent app versions group them in Settings and privacy → Privacy → Activity centre → Manage comments. You get a list of your posts, and the ones marked “Comments not allowed” go back on when you tap the circle next to them.

An empty comment section holds other people back: nobody wants to write the first message under a silent video. Getting a conversation going changes how visitors behave, the same way a pack of TikTok views does on a post starting from zero.

Comments locked: the under 16 rule

Nine locked accounts out of ten come down to this, and no settings tutorial will change it. TikTok applies automatic restrictions based on the birth date you gave when you signed up.

• Under 16. Comments default to Friends. The only other choice is Nobody. “Everyone” either does not show up or refuses to respond when you tap it.
• Ages 13 to 15. The account is created private. Only followers you have approved see your videos, so only they can comment.
• Ages 16 and 17. “Everyone” becomes available again, though several settings still start switched off and need turning on by hand.

The second trap gets forgotten a lot: Family Pairing. If a parent has linked their account to yours, they can lock your comment settings from their own phone. The menu opens, refuses to save, and the only way out goes through them.

If your birth date is simply wrong, no field in the app lets you edit it, and that is deliberate. The official route is a report: Profile → ☰ → Settings and privacy → Feedback and help → Report a problem, where you explain the mistake and attach government issued ID. It takes several days and the answer is not automatic. Making a second account with a different date is the tempting mistake here: you start from nothing and the suspension risk stays.

@crystalguidancejen

The age lock explained: without proof of ID, the birth date does not move. #tiktokcomments #commentnotavailable

♬ original sound – Jen Faeline (Crystal Guidance)

Letting only followers or friends comment

Between a section open to the world and a section that is shut there is a middle setting plenty of people look for without finding, on that same “Who can comment on your videos” row.

• Everyone. Any TikTok account, including people who do not follow you. Public profiles, 16 and over.
• Friends. Only followers you follow back, so accounts where the follow goes both ways. This is the real filter against strangers, and the default on young accounts.
• Nobody. Section closed everywhere, old videos included.

The “followers only” case works differently: switch the account to private, in Privacy → Private account. Your videos leave the For You feed, you approve every follow request, and nobody else can write. In exchange you lose a good share of your reach, which is no small thing when you are trying to grow.

These three options cover who can comment, not who can read the comments. On a public account the section stays visible to everyone even if only your friends write in it.

Filter, pin, hide and delete in bulk

Opening comments is only worth it if you keep a grip on what gets written there. The tools sit in Privacy → Comments, plus a long press inside the section itself.

Filter keywords. Switch the option on, then build the list term by term. Any comment containing one of those words leaves the conversation, for you and for other readers. TikTok raised the cap from 100 to 200 keywords per account, enough to cover insults, their misspelled variants and topics you never want to see again.

Filter spam and offensive comments. One toggle that lets TikTok set aside anything it reads as dodgy. Handy, but blunt: it also catches harmless messages.

Filter all comments. The strictest option, where nothing appears until you say so. The queue sits in Comments → Comment management → Review filtered comments, and each message gets approved or deleted. Keep it for touchy subjects, since manual approval cools a conversation down fast.

Pin. Long press the comment, then Pin. It moves to the top of the section and stays there. One pinned comment per video, and “Unpin” frees the slot. It is TikTok’s most underused tool: one good pinned comment sets the tone for the whole thread.

Delete in bulk. Long press a comment, then Manage multiple comments, or use the filter icon at the top of the section. You select up to 100 comments at once and pick Delete, Report or Block accounts. After a pile on, that replaces an hour of clicking one by one.

Hiding one account’s comments without blocking them. Worth saying plainly: TikTok has no “hide this person” button, unlike the Restrict feature on Instagram. Two workarounds actually hold up. Add their verbal habits to your filtered keyword list. Or switch on “Filter all comments” and never approve theirs: they keep seeing their message posted while nobody else reads it. Beyond that you are down to deleting, or blocking if the behaviour repeats.

Why a posted comment stays invisible to everyone else

The most confusing case: you write, the message shows up with your avatar, and nobody sees it. No notification warns you. Here are the reasons, from the most common down.

1. A creator filter caught it. One of your words is on their list, or they switched on “Filter all comments”. Your message goes into a queue and exists for nobody until it is approved. On your side, nothing says so.
2. TikTok’s automatic filter judged it. A link, a phone number, one ambiguous word, and the comment leaves the conversation without warning.
3. Your account is too new. In the first days TikTok limits what leaves a fresh profile. Comments go through, with far less distribution.
4. A restriction sits on your account. After a community guidelines warning, comment reach drops for a while. Creators call it a comment shadowban.
5. The creator closed the section or blocked you. Your old message disappears for everyone, while it sometimes still shows on your screen until the app refreshes.

To work out which one applies, open the video in a browser while logged out, or from another phone. If your comment is not there, it was filtered. There is nothing to repair on your end beyond rewriting the message without the word that snagged it.