What Happens When You Block Someone on an iPhone?

We've all been there – getting unwanted messages or incoming calls is something nearly all of us have experienced once or twice. But what exactly happens when you block someone, be it by accident or intentionally?

In today's article, we'll cover everything there is to know about blocking contacts on your iPhone, what it means, and what the other party experiences when they get blocked.

How iPhone Blocking Works

When you block someone's number on an iPhone, the block applies across all phone calls, messages, and FaceTime.

• Calls: When you block someone from your contacts, they can still try to call you, but their call will go straight to voicemail. Your phone won’t ring, and you won’t receive a notification.
• Messages: If a blocked phone number sends you an iMessage, they may still see their message as delivered on their end, but you’ll never receive it. For SMS, the blocked texts are dropped silently without notification.
• FaceTime: Just like with phone calls, FaceTime attempts from blocked contacts won’t connect. The call will keep ringing on their end, but you won’t receive any alerts or notifications.

What the Blocked Person Sees

Blocking contacts can be a potentially sticky situation, especially if we're talking about blocking someone you know in real life. Let's get into the question of what happens when you block someone on an iPhone.

Do They Know They've Been Blocked?

When you block a phone number on your iPhone, the blocked party will have no way of knowing that you blocked them. They won’t get a notification, and instead of realizing they’re blocked, they’ll just assume you’re not responding.

Can Blocked Messages Still Be Delivered?

A blocked person can continue sending you messages, and while they'll see their message marked as delivered, you won't ever receive them due to message restrictions. Group chats, however, are an exception. If you and your blocked contact are in the same group chat, their messages will still appear in that conversation for everyone, including you.

Voicemail Behavior After Blocking

We already mentioned that incoming calls end up as voicemails, but those aren't stored in your main inbox. All voicemails from blocked contacts are stored in your Blocked Messages, a different folder where you can check blocked voicemails. The only difference is that for the blocked person, it will look like they just left a normal voicemail.

What You See When You Block Someone

When you decide to block someone, that pretty much ends all further contact from the unwanted party immediately. Your device will handle everything smoothly in the background.

iMessage Read Receipts & Missed Call Notifications

Once you block someone, their text messages will remain undelivered, even if it may look like the message is delivered to the other party. The same goes for phone calls. After blocking someone, their calls won't go through to you or appear in your recent call list unless they leave a voicemail. But even then, that voicemail will land in a separate folder.

Can You Still Text a Blocked Person?

If you want to text a blocked number, you can do that, as the communication will look like nothing's changed for the blocked contact. However, while your messages will continue to reach the recipient, you won't receive any messages from them.

How to Tell If Someone Blocked You on iPhone

Apple doesn't inform users when they get blocked by someone, so while you may be thinking of blocking someone, you can get blocked yourself just the same, without ever knowing. If you want to confirm whether someone has blocked you, there are a few indications to look for.

• Signs in iMessage: If your texts always show as sent but never change to delivered, you might be blocked by the recipient. It could also be due to the other person’s phone being off or out of service.
• Voicemail redirects: In some cases, your call might be pushed straight to voicemail when you call someone who has blocked you, even when you try at different times.
• Ring once, get sent to voicemail: A common clue is when the phone rings once, or only a short time, and then always jumps to voicemail.

How to Block & Unblock Someone on iPhone

Whether you blocked someone by mistake or you want to lift the block, this can be done easily. You can also block and unblock someone from several apps at once, such as Phone, Contacts, Messages, or FaceTime, because the block settings are linked.

Step-by-Step Guide via Contacts & Phone

1. Open the Phone app.
2. Go to the Recents tab or open a saved Contact.
3. Tap the Info button next to the number or contact name.
4. Scroll down and tap Block Caller.
5. Confirm by tapping Block Contact.

To unblock, follow the same steps and tap Unblock this Caller instead.

Blocking Through Messages or FaceTime

• Messages: Open the conversation with the person, tap their name or number at the top, then select Info, and Block Caller.
• FaceTime: Open the FaceTime app, tap the Info next to the contact, then scroll down and choose Block Caller.

Managing Your Blocked Contacts List

If you want to review all blocked contacts and manage who should remain blocked or get unblocked, you can easily access the blocked list by:

1. Going to Settings → Blocked Contacts.
2. Tap Edit to remove someone from the list, or Add New to block more numbers and contacts.

How Can a VPN Help You?

A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, is a protection service that secures and encrypts connections between your device and the internet. Without a VPN, you'd normally access online content directly, meaning that websites and apps would receive your connection requests with individual information about you.

However, if you use a VPN for iPhone, it processes your connection information first and masks it under a different IP address, effectively making you anonymous online.

Blocks Don’t Hide Your IP

When you browse, stream, or use apps, your IP address can still be visible to websites, apps, including the people you interact with online. If you think getting someone FaceTime-blocked is enough to secure your online activities from that person, it's actually not the case.

CometVPN caters to all users, both experienced and new, offering reliable and high-quality VPN services. The platform is built with the end user in mind, so you spend less time navigating and more time securing your connections.

If you're interested, you can download CometVPN for iOS and check it out.

Alternatives to Blocking: Other iPhone Privacy Features

Blocking someone is a powerful feature, but in most cases, it can be too definitive and unnecessary. As an alternative, you could try other built-in iPhone features to reduce interruptions.

• Silence unknown callers: Using this option will silence unknown numbers, recent calls, or Siri suggestions while granting you access to recent calls. You won't hear a ring, but your recent calls will still appear.
• Focus Mode or Do Not Disturb: Control who can reach you and when with Focus Mode. Plus, aside from muting alerts at night and during work, you can even sync focus settings across your Apple devices.
• iMessage filtering: Separate texts from people who aren't in your contacts. Once you specify, these contacts will go into a separate "Unknown Senders" tab, preventing spam.

Wrapping Up

The block feature on your iPhone is an incredibly effective way to stop unwanted calls, messages, and FaceTime requests. Even better, the blocked person isn’t notified, so you can cut off contact without them knowing.

At the same time, blocking doesn't equal total security – that's where a reliable VPN service like CometVPN comes in. With a VPN, you can be sure that your blocked contacts can't reach you or see your online activities, adding an extra layer of protection for your iPhone.