There are now 1 million paid subscriptions to creators on Instagram, slowly transforming the platform into a space where creators can get paid directly by their fans. It’s a big milestone but a small number for Instagram: the service has around 2 billion monthly users. Patreon, meanwhile, is estimated to have more than 30 million paid subscriptions — albeit with about a decade’s head start. Meta announced the milestone today alongside some other news related to creators getting paid.
Subscriptions initially launched in the US in July 2022 and then expanded to dozens more countries over the following months. Meta says it’s still expanding additional paid features, like “Instagram gifts” — essentially, paid tips — to more countries, too. The company still isn’t taking a cut of the money that creators make, though it plans to do so eventually.