Story perspectives

Meta purge deletes bots, Jenner loses 15M followers

5/8/2026

Summary

Meta Instagram Purge

Meta launched an Instagram AI purge on May 6 2026, deleting millions of bot and inactive accounts.
Kylie Jenner lost about 15 million followers, the largest individual drop reported.
Cristiano Ronaldo lost 6,622,220 followers.
BLACKPINK and BTS each shed roughly 10 million and 7 million followers respectively.
Meta said the purge removed ghost, under-13 AI-flagged, and 24-month inactive accounts to raise real engagement, causing smaller creators to fall 2% to 5%.

Summary

Ronaldo Earnings

Ronaldo earns £2.57 million per Instagram post, after a prior Sport Lobster deal paid £250,000 for about 30-40 posts.
Harry Hugo, former head of social at Sport Lobster, said each Ronaldo post generated two thousand app downloads.
Instagram executed a six-hour bot purge that removed millions of fake and inactive accounts.
Instagram has not commented on the purge despite its effect on accounts such as President Donald Trump, Pope Francis and Justin Bieber.

History

Historical Context

The 2026 Instagram purge announced by Meta in May follows a pattern of platform-wide clean-ups that began with Twitter’s mid-2018 crackdown, which cut about 6 % of users and cost Donald Trump roughly 100 000 followers. Both efforts aim to curb bots and inactive accounts that have long inflated social-media metrics significantly.

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Meta Instagram Purge

Meta launched an Instagram AI purge on May 6 2026, deleting millions of bot and inactive accounts.
Kylie Jenner lost about 15 million followers, the largest individual drop reported.
Cristiano Ronaldo lost 6,622,220 followers.
BLACKPINK and BTS each shed roughly 10 million and 7 million followers respectively.
Meta said the purge removed ghost, under-13 AI-flagged, and 24-month inactive accounts to raise real engagement, causing smaller creators to fall 2% to 5%.

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