There are new updates that have been added at the bottom of the story….

“Mine dropped 500 followers,” one Instagram user said on Twitter today. The other one quoted that tweet to add “mine dropped almost 1000 followers.”

well mine dropped almost 1000 followers 💁🏻‍♂️ okay that’s not too bad for some. but least at heads up would’ve been nice lol @instagram im waving @ u if ya’ll can’t fix this up just fix my dms!!!! it’s not working well either https://t.co/2z39Ep2JPN — ken najera (@kennajeraa) February 13, 2019

Instagram deleted inactive accounts and I lost 600 followers 😂😂😂 — @yiyieeen (@yiyieeen) February 13, 2019

These are normal users, but what about influencers? Well, looks like they are also having similar experiences. For example, celebrity stylist James Charles said they lost almost half a million followers.

why did I just lose over half a million followers @instagram wyd sis — James Charles (@jamescharles) February 13, 2019

And fans are pointing out that Ariana Grande’s as well as Selena Gomez follower count on Instagram also dropped by millions.

📱| Ariana has lost 3 MILLION followers on Instagram. pic.twitter.com/3gcoTyauHP — Ariana News Fact! (@ArianaNewsFact) February 13, 2019

am I the only one who noticed Ariana lost 3 million followers on Instagram in one day? pic.twitter.com/pKU491UxX1 — тεssα (@grandetears) February 13, 2019

Instagram started after several years to deleted accounts that don't fulfill her rules from her system, Selena Gomez lost about 2 million followers pic.twitter.com/Kuwa2LoHfI — Selena Gomez News (@_selenagomezecu) February 13, 2019

And the list goes on…

Is @instagram glitching for anyone? My Instagram was at 166k and now it’s at 158k …. I’m so confused — Shelby (@shelbytriglia) February 13, 2019

Instagram deleting many fake instagram ids.. Is that reason why ashi and Randeep followers decreased.. But it looks impossible 😶 ashi Ka 321 se 309k and Randeep 324 se 306k #YehUnDinonKiBaatHai pic.twitter.com/44AcwyUy3Z — Piya21- panditji in samaina ki shadi 😂 (@Ashinaina1) February 13, 2019

What's wrong with Instagram ? Why some celebs lost more than 200K followers? Shinhye lost 200K followers in two days 🤦🤦 pic.twitter.com/5JRc9a6HHj — JongShin Avid Fans (@SuccessfullMin1) February 13, 2019

Some are pointing out that even Instagram’s own account is down by millions.

Instagram you just lost 3 million followers on your own account!!! FIX THIS! Please — Holly (@tchalamet_ny) February 13, 2019

So what the hell is happening? Well, while we do not have an official word from Instagram yet, it does look like the Facebook-owned social media company is going after spam, bot, or inactive accounts.

whoa lol, instagram just mass-deleted a bunch of bot/spam accounts and i lost like ~2k followers lol. my engagement's bout to be lit — 𝔧. (@cruelladevu) February 13, 2019

Apparently instagram is deleting spam and inactive accounts — SLADE (@mermaidslade) February 13, 2019

instagram deleted fake followers not inactive accounts. I lost like 100 tho I did have some damn bots I was tired of messaging me tho! — ez (@eztaughtme) February 13, 2019

Going by reports, this latest round of purge started only a few hours ago. But nothing can be said for sure as it could be that Instagram may have been deleting accounts for quite some time now, just that they have suddenly shifted gears now.

Anyway, we’ll have to wait and see what the company has to say on this.

Not the first time

This is not the first time something like this has happened over at Instagram. Back in November last year, the Facebook-owned social media platform announced they’re reducing inauthentic activity on Instagram.

Recently, we’ve seen accounts use third-party apps to artificially grow their audience. Starting today, we will begin removing inauthentic likes, follows and comments from accounts that use third-party apps to boost their popularity

We’re taking a number of steps to limit this kind of unwelcome behavior. Accounts we identify using these services will receive an in-app message alerting them that we have removed the inauthentic likes, follows and comments given by their account to others. We will also ask them to secure their account by changing their password

You can read the complete announcement here.

Have already been deleting fan accounts

The clean-up of sorts at Instagram apparently started a few weeks ago, when we highlighted a lot of reports of fan accounts being deleted.

@instagram please stop deleting fan accounts. We’re not impersonating our idols, we’re supporting them. People work hard for those accounts and for most of us, it’s our happy place. Please don’t take that away from us. — rach #justiceformj (@buterasmj) January 14, 2019

when 100s of fan accounts run by real people are being deleted on your platform but drawing giraffes seems more important — dee (@ayydweeba) January 14, 2019

well they disabled mine so i think its true😂 — simone (@starsmalec) January 14, 2019

Hi, I’m Amaya. I’m from the account @/t.s.hollander on Instagram and I’m moving my stuff here too while Instagram is being an ass and deleting fan accounts. I will be posting these from my first post to my most recent to bare with me while I post my cringe first imagines😬 pic.twitter.com/Fs4rockyPa — amaya✨ (@tshollanderr) January 13, 2019

Even an extremely popular PewDiePie fan account dubbed ‘classicpewds’ – which had over 100,000 followers, including PewDiePie himself – was deleted after being reported.

Nat’s backup account (classic.pewds) was also deleted by Instagram. She has since been urging followers to get the culprit – who reported both her accounts – deleted from Instagram.

What’s more, even social media star Zach Clayton calls out Instagram over fan accounts deletion.

instagram gotta chill with this deleting fan accounts mess — BadZach (@BadZach) January 16, 2019

More on that here.

Instagram not the only service to do such clean-ups

Apart from Instagram, other social media platforms are also part this ‘seasonal’ cleanup. For example, Twitter also started to wipe out fake accounts and bots. It directly affects celebrities and political figures as they are losing huge number of followers.

The number of Twitter followers is often considered as a prime parameter of popularity. But allegedly most of them are not even operated actual human beings.

40% of Kamala Harris' followers are bots pic.twitter.com/JFc0nTfhW8 — Jack Posobiec 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) January 29, 2019

Twitter wants to come up with an cleaner solution, which removes the external driving factors that can motivate the voters, especially when the election season is here in US and India.

The Parliamentary Commitee on Information Technology will examine the issue: SAFEGUARDING CITIZENS RIGHTS ON SOCIAL/ONLINE NEWS MEDIA PLATFORMS MEITY & TWITTER will present their views. You can tweet/email your views:

[email protected] pic.twitter.com/bDYoSv5OHd — Anurag Thakur (@ianuragthakur) February 5, 2019

In fact, the result of the crackdown (which is running since 2018’s November) is quite astonishing as Indian PM Narendra Modi lost around 100,000 followers post the crackdown.

Slow and steady always wins the race. It’s important to remain true to yourself at all times. Numbers don’t matter in the long run, trust & credibility does. pic.twitter.com/sU5sJRBTt9 — Divya Spandana/Ramya (@divyaspandana) February 11, 2019

Update 1

Could this be a glitch? We have now come across some user reports that indicate Instagram may be glitching for some:

There is a global issue with #Instagram. Many users have mentioned that they lost huge number of followers. It seems like it's not an fake followers clean up but an Instagram technical issue.#instagramdown pic.twitter.com/OpGVKZaXtf — Tigran Matinyan (@Tigran_Matinyan) February 13, 2019

Ok @instagram , how is it that when I got up this morning, according to my page I'd lost 30 followers overnight, yet when I check on it through my daughter's account I have a different amount of followers?? I find this very odd. Please explain pic.twitter.com/0U6z3kMyvd — Laura (@Pinkabell78) February 13, 2019

A friend as I were both kicked off your follower list but we refollowed. No clue what’s going on but definitely won’t be updating ig until the acknowledge and speak on what’s happening — Rai (@halalbeautie) February 13, 2019

I have lost some followers overnight and it is showing that I have unfollowed 30 and my account showing some post which I have deleted while ago. How can this be possible, and this is safety for Instagram users?

And who will solve this?@instagram #Instagram #Ahmadabad #Wednesday — Vatsal (@vatsal10_98) February 13, 2019

Dude Instagram deleted all my photos — madz (@maddie1flanagan) February 13, 2019

i’m confused… is instagram glitching? first ariana got to the same amount as selena, then selena lost 2 mil, then selena got them back and ari lost 2 mil… what?? pic.twitter.com/xbsT1JNNCE — 𝔫𝔞𝔱𝔥𝔞𝔫; (@nathansugIy) February 13, 2019

Update 2

We’ve reached out to Instagram to know what they have to say on the matter, and will update the story as and when they respond. Until then, use the comments section below to share your current Instagram experience.

Update 3

Check out the video embedded in the tweet below where James Charles talks about the ongoing Instagram issue:

okay so literally just lost 40 followers on instagram and i was so confused but sister james figured out the issue… soooooo instagram needs to get their shit together because this stupid ass glitch is annoying and ngl im pissed @jamescharles pic.twitter.com/oofK03FTRB — lexi (@lexvit14) February 13, 2019

Update 4

Reports of more celebs losing millions of followers:

What's happened in their ig followers????? #BLACKPINK #BLACKPINKonGMA

Rośe and jisoo supposed to have 11m+ and lisa supposed to be 14.9 pic.twitter.com/1rNCZKriJb — STANNER OF BP AND IN (@Jancyrgo) February 13, 2019

Gigi lost almost 1 million followers because Instagram started to delete some accounts. pic.twitter.com/B8JTDdO7O9 — ㅤ (@doublegiforce) February 13, 2019

Update 5

This user says updating the app brings things back to normal.

I updated my app and it returned to normal 🤷‍♀️ — Deborah Champion (@champignons) February 13, 2019

Try it out and let us know in the comments section below if this workaround fixes the problem.

Meanwhile, fake messages like the following are in circulation. We urge you not to take them seriously.

I don't know if this is fake news or not, but I took this from one of the post of my Instagram friend. This might explain everything about this disturbing trend of IG deleting accounts, especially bot accounts, as well as real people accounts. This explains the lost in followers. pic.twitter.com/Z9qvxieP0w — Alchemo Lozano (@Alchem0_Lozan0) February 13, 2019

Update 6

Popular social media consultant Matt Navarra has shared link to a doc which lists a continuously updated list of popular accounts who lost followers.

The BIG Instagram Account Purge – Feb 2019 Instagram removed a LOT of fake accounts in the past 24 hours. Here's a running list of popular accounts who lost followers (updating across the day) 📝 https://t.co/RDSS0rHbxJ pic.twitter.com/18zTbAwMlv — Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) February 13, 2019

Update 7

Actress Joan Collins has strongly voiced her concern over the ongoing purge.

What is the point of carefully writing and preparing your own Instagram posts, doing them yourself then they arbitrarily decide to purge? Having had 3000 followers deleted I shan’t be Instagraming anymore — Joan Collins (@Joancollinsdbe) February 13, 2019

Update 8

Here’s an official word on the matter. Instagram says this is an issue and they are working to fix it.

We’re aware of an issue causing a change in account follower numbers for some people right now. We’re working quickly to fix this

We’re aware of an issue that is causing a change in account follower numbers for some people right now. We’re working to resolve this as quickly as possible. — Instagram (@instagram) February 13, 2019

So turns out this may not be an intentional accounts purge. Rest assured, we’ll update the story with more details as and when something newsworthy happens.

Update 9

This user says they got their lost followers back after a while.

so when i woke up i had lost over 1000 followers and now they're just ….back…. @instagram sort ur shit out pic.twitter.com/mvNW24CoKo — C A I T 💘 (@peachcait_) February 13, 2019

Has Instagram started rolling out a fix? Well, we aren’t sure at the moment.

Update 10

We have got a tip from one of our readers saying you can’t even follow back an affected account.

People can’t even follow back it’s not letting — Vivian Hicks (@VivianHicks) February 13, 2019

We’re not sure how widespread this specific problem is, but it does seem related to the overall bigger issue. Here’s one more such report:

#INSTAGRAM UPDATE: If it said I unfollowed you, your account suddenly unfollowed mine, or it is not allowing you to follow me back—sorry! It appears @instagram is experiencing a bug. I realized when I lost thousands of followers, and randomly started to unfollow friends. pic.twitter.com/VmVRfbETle — Chris Garafola (@CGarafola) February 13, 2019

Let us know in comments below if you are facing this problem as well.

Update 11

Some users are reporting their follower count has in fact gone up.

I lost followers too but checked on my recent activity and had gained followers?? Wtf instagram lolll https://t.co/o5HftzKkqr — Colleen Larson (@ColleenMLarson) February 13, 2019

losing followers on instagram is a glitch. i lost 100 followers but now i gained 100 followers back again — 🌙 (@lookngfryou) February 13, 2019

Update 12

A few hours ago, Instagram has shared an ETA for the bug fix. Here’s what the company says:

Update: we’re expecting to have this issue resolved by 9 a.m. PST tomorrow. We understand this is frustrating, and our team is hard at work to get things back to normal

Update: we’re expecting to have this issue resolved by 9 a.m. PST tomorrow. We understand this is frustrating, and our team is hard at work to get things back to normal. — Instagram (@instagram) February 13, 2019

Update 13

The Instagram app is now directly informing users about this bug through a notification.

Okay, this might be the reason why many instagram users had lost followers overnight. 🧐 pic.twitter.com/Hz3CVr0oW8 — TJ 🇵🇭 (@jennifertolibas) February 14, 2019

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