Instagram launched on October 6, 2010 and reached one million accounts by that December and ten million by September 2011. Facebook agreed to acquire it in April 2012, and the deal closed in August 2012, when Instagram had over 100 million registered users. It is now one of Meta’s four Family of Apps products.
Two format changes shaped how the platform is used: Stories, launched worldwide in August 2016, and Reels, the short-form video product launched in 2020.
Reported scale
Meta reports usage only across its Family of Apps — 3.58 billion daily active people on average in December 2025 — and does not break out an Instagram figure. Instagram’s own materials describe the platform as “helping over 1 billion people create and share.” Larger per-app monthly-user counts in circulation are third-party estimates, not company-reported numbers.
Political content in recommendations
On February 9, 2024 Instagram announced that “we won’t proactively recommend content about politics on recommendation surfaces across Instagram and Threads,” defining political content as material “potentially related to things like laws, elections, or social topics.” The policy applies to public accounts surfaced through Explore, Reels, In-Feed Recommendations and Suggested Users; it does not restrict content from accounts a user already follows. The announcement carries later update notes dated January 7, 2025 and May 28, 2025, neither of which withdraws the policy, and points readers to the Meta Transparency Center for the current position.
Sources
- 01.
Instagram. Instagram Product Evolution. Instagram's own milestone timeline. Source for "OCTOBER 6, 2010 - Instagram Launches," one million accounts by December 2010 ("By December, 1 million people create an account"), ten million by September 2011 ("By September, there are 10 million people on Instagram"), "APRIL 2012 - Instagram joins Facebook," the August 2016 worldwide launch of Stories, and the 2020 launch of Reels. Verified against the capture: about.instagram.com returns HTTP 400 to every client.
- 02.
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Facebook, Inc. Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2012. Source for the completed acquisition: "In August 2012, we acquired Instagram, a photo-sharing service with over 100 million registered users." Instagram's own timeline dates the announcement to April 2012; the filing dates the closing to August 2012.
- 03.
Instagram. About Us. Source for the only company-published scale figure available — Instagram "helping over 1 billion people create and share." No Instagram-specific monthly active user count is published. Verified against the capture: about.instagram.com returns HTTP 400 to every client.
- 04.
Instagram. Continuing Our Approach to Political Content on Instagram and Threads. Verified against the capture: about.instagram.com returns HTTP 400 to every client. Dated February 9, 2024, with updates noted January 7, 2025 and May 28, 2025. Source for the policy — "we won't proactively recommend content about politics on recommendation surfaces across Instagram and Threads" — its definition of political content as material "potentially related to things like laws, elections, or social topics," and its scope: public accounts on Explore, Reels, In-Feed Recommendations and Suggested Users, not accounts a user already follows.
- 05.
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Meta Platforms, Inc. Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2025. Source for Instagram being reported only within Meta's Family of Apps metric — 3.58 billion daily active people on average during December 2025 across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp combined — with no per-app breakout.