October 2010 - The first ever pic
Instagram officially launches in October 2010, gaining 25,000 users in a day. The first ever picture was uploaded by Instagram's co-founder, Kevin Systrom, of his golden retriever sitting at a Taco stand. It's safe to say dogs have become pretty synonymous with the app.
January 2011 - Hashtags
Instagram added hashtags in January 2011 to help users discover photographs and other users.
April 2012 - Facebook buys Instagram
Mark Zuckerberg purchases Instagram for a whopping billion dollars, despite Instagram having no revenue stream and only 13 employees!
June 2012 - Explore with Instagram
A new Explore Page is added to the app, fallowing the users to find new accounts and users to follow and engage with.
May 2013 - Tagging
Instagram adds photo tagging
June 2013 - Video sharing added
Instagram rolled out video sharing in June 2013, allowing users to upload videos of up to 15 seconds.
December 2013 - Sliding into DMs
Instagram added their direct message feature allowing users to communicate directly to users.
June 2014 - New editing tools
Instagram adds an editing section allowing users to not only add Instagram filters, but also edit image characteristics like brightness, contrast etc in the app.
September 2015 - Advertising
Instagram allows advertisers to share 30-second in-feed video ads.
March 2016 - 60 second video shares
Instagram allows users to post videos that are 60 seconds in length.
August 2016 - Stories launch
Instagram launches their own version of stories, very similar to Snapchat stories, stories disappear after 24-hours. Now Instagram's most popular feature.
November 2016 - Instagram becomes shoppable and LIVE
In perhaps one of the apps' biggest updates, Instagram releases Shoppable Tags and the ability to go LIVE for up to an hour.
February 2017 - Carousel posts
Instagram releases carousel posts, allowing users the ability to upload up to 10 pieces of content at once in a carousel.
June 2018 - IGTV Releases
Doubling down on video, Instagram launches IGTV allowing users to upload videos up to 10 minutes in length.
June 2018 - 1 Billion users
Instagram reaches an incredible one billion monthly active users.
March 2019 - Checkout on Instagram
Instagram allows users to purchase products inside the app.
May 2020 - The monetization of IGTV
Instagram allows creators to make money directly from IGTV. They announced that ads will begin playing in IGTV videos for a selected 200 approved advertising partners. The app will be sharing an ‘industry standard’ 55% cut and aim to expand this group of 200 to more creators around the globe.
August 2020 - Instagram competes with TikTok
With TikTok hot the heels on Instagram, Instagram launches Reels, a short form of video that allows users to create and discover short entertaining videos, up to 30-seconds in length.
10 Years of Instagram
Can you believe Instagram has been around for over a decade? In a marketplace saturated with social media networks, Instagram has had to evolve to stay relevant and ahead of the competition - and you have to say Instagram has done just that fending off similar social networking channels like Snapchat and TikTok.