The ENTIRE History of Instagram in 18 Minutes — Transcript

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1. 0:00In January 2012, Kodak, the company that
2. 0:03invented the digital camera, filed for
3. 0:05bankruptcy. At its peak, Kodak employed
4. 0:08around 145,000 people. 3 months later, a
5. 0:12tiny app with just 13 employees was sold
6. 0:14to Facebook for $1 billion. That app let
7. 0:17you take a photo, make it look a little
8. 0:19better, and share it with your friends.
9. 0:22It had no revenue and no business model,
10. 0:25and it was only 18 months old. How does
11. 0:27a handful of people with a photo app
12. 0:30become worth more than a company that
13. 0:31defined photography for 100 years? And
14. 0:34how did that app end up reshaping
15. 0:36culture, advertising, and the way
16. 0:39billions of people see the world? This
17. 0:41is the story of Instagram.
18. 0:44Our story starts with a young man named
19. 0:46Kevin Systrom, born in December 1983 and
20. 0:50raised in Massachusetts. He was a
21. 0:52curious kid who loved computers, but he
22. 0:55was also drawn to creative things like
23. 0:57photography, design, and even music. He
24. 1:00went to Stanford University, where he
25. 1:02studied management science and
26. 1:04engineering, and that mix of business
27. 1:06and technology would define everything
28. 1:09he built. While at Stanford, Kevin spent
29. 1:12a term studying abroad in Florence,
30. 1:14Italy. There, he took a photography
31. 1:16class, and his professor handed him a
32. 1:18Holga, a cheap plastic toy camera that
33. 1:21takes soft, dreamy square photographs.
34. 1:24Kevin loved how it made ordinary moments
35. 1:26look like art. It was a small detail at
36. 1:29the time, but it planted a seed. Years
37. 1:31later, that square photo format would
38. 1:33become one of the most recognizable
39. 1:35visual signatures on the internet.
40. 1:38Back at Stanford, Kevin wasn't just a
41. 1:40student. He interned at a podcasting
42. 1:42startup called Odeo, the company that
43. 1:45would soon transform into Twitter.
44. 1:47He got a front-row seat to how a small
45. 1:49team could create a product that spread
46. 1:51like wildfire. After graduating in 2006,
47. 1:55he went to work at Google, helping on
48. 1:57products like Gmail. Later, he joined a
49. 1:59small travel startup called Nextstop.
50. 2:01Even then, Silicon Valley was already
51. 2:04noticing him. Mark Zuckerberg reportedly
52. 2:07tried to recruit Kevin to join Facebook.
53. 2:09Kevin said no. He wanted to build
54. 2:11something of his own.
55. 2:14By 2010, Kevin had a plan. He started
56. 2:17teaching himself to code at night and on
57. 2:19weekends. The result was an app called
58. 2:21Bourbon, named after his love of
59. 2:23whiskey. Bourbon was a mobile check-in
60. 2:25app in the style of Foursquare, which
61. 2:28was hot at the time. You could say where
62. 2:30you were, make plans with friends, earn
63. 2:33points for hanging out, and almost as an
64. 2:35afterthought, post photos. The app was
65. 2:38cluttered. It tried to do too many
66. 2:40things, but it was good enough to get
67. 2:42Kevin noticed. At a startup event, he
68. 2:45met investors from two firms, Baseline
69. 2:48Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. They
70. 2:51liked what they saw, and Kevin raised
71. 2:53about half a million dollars to turn
72. 2:55Bourbon into a real company. With that
73. 2:57money, he brought on a partner who would
74. 2:59become just as important as he was. Mike
75. 3:02Krieger was born in Brazil, studied
76. 3:04symbolic systems at Stanford, and was a
77. 3:07brilliant engineer and designer.
78. 3:09Together, the two of them started
79. 3:11working out of a small shared office in
80. 3:13San Francisco.
81. 3:14But, there was a problem. Bourbon wasn't
82. 3:17taking off. People signed up, poked
83. 3:20around, and left. The app had too many
84. 3:23features, and nothing about it was
85. 3:25special.
86. 3:27Then Kevin and Mike did something that's
87. 3:28very hard for any founder to do.
88. 3:31They looked at what users were actually
89. 3:33doing instead of what they wanted users
90. 3:35to do. And what people kept using, again
91. 3:38and again, was the photo feature.
92. 3:40There's a famous story about this. Kevin
93. 3:43took a vacation to Mexico with his
94. 3:45girlfriend, now his wife, Nicole. While
95. 3:48they were out walking, Nicole told him
96. 3:50she didn't like posting photos on
97. 3:52Bourbon because her pictures never
98. 3:54looked as good as other people's.
99. 3:56Kevin's answer was simple. He told her
100. 3:58that the photos you see online look good
101. 4:00because the people posting them use
102. 4:02filters. He took one of her photos, ran
103. 4:05it through a filter, and she loved it.
104. 4:08The photo looked beautiful and she
105. 4:10posted it. That moment changed
106. 4:12everything. Kevin realized that the
107. 4:14problem wasn't taking photos, it was
108. 4:16feeling proud enough to share them. If
109. 4:19the app could make anyone's photo look
110. 4:21good in a single tap, people would share
111. 4:23more. So, Kevin and Mike made a bold
112. 4:25decision. They cut almost everything
113. 4:27from Bourbon. No check-ins, no plans, no
114. 4:31points. They kept only three things:
115. 4:33photos, comments, and likes. It was a
116. 4:36massive risk because they were throwing
117. 4:38away most of their product. But, they
118. 4:40built it fast, in about 8 weeks. Then,
119. 4:44they needed a name. They wanted
120. 4:46something that captured two ideas: an
121. 4:48instant camera and a telegram, a message
122. 4:51sent quickly across distance. Instant
123. 4:54plus telegram gave them Instagram.
124. 4:57On October 6th, 2010, Instagram launched
125. 5:01on Apple's App Store. The team braced
126. 5:03for a slow start, but within hours, the
127. 5:06sign-ups started pouring in. 25,000
128. 5:09people joined on the first day. The
129. 5:11servers, which were running on Amazon's
130. 5:13cloud, were strained to the limit and
131. 5:16Kevin and Mike barely slept as they
132. 5:18worked to keep everything online. Within
133. 5:20a week, they had around 100,000 users.
134. 5:24By December, just 2 and 1/2 months after
135. 5:26launch, Instagram passed 1 million. Why
136. 5:30did it work so well? Part of it was the
137. 5:32product. Instagram was simple, fast, and
138. 5:35gave you instant results.
139. 5:37The filters had names like Early Bird,
140. 5:40X-Pro II, and Valencia. And they made
141. 5:43everyday life look warm, nostalgic, and
142. 5:45cinematic. Part of it was the timing.
143. 5:48The iPhone 4 had just come out with a
144. 5:50much better camera, and people were
145. 5:51looking for something to do with it. And
146. 5:54part of it was community. The early team
147. 5:56worked hard to make Instagram feel
148. 5:58friendly. They featured great
149. 6:00photographers, showcased creative users,
150. 6:03and built a culture of positivity.
151. 6:06Instagram didn't feel like a place to
152. 6:07argue. It felt like a place to share
153. 6:10what you loved.
154. 6:11Early celebrities and tech figures
155. 6:13joined, including Twitter's own Jack
156. 6:15Dorsey, which gave the app an extra
157. 6:17boost of attention. By the end of 2011,
158. 6:20Apple named Instagram its iPhone app of
159. 6:23the year.
160. 6:24If you're enjoying this story so far,
161. 6:27subscribe to CEO Zoned so you don't miss
162. 6:29the next company's history.
163. 6:32All this growth meant one thing.
164. 6:34Investors wanted in. In early 2011,
165. 6:37Instagram raised $7 million from
166. 6:40Benchmark Capital at a valuation of
167. 6:42around $25 million. For a company with
168. 6:45almost no revenue, that was already
169. 6:47impressive. Then things sped up even
170. 6:50more. In April 2012, Instagram raised
171. 6:53another $50 million from investors,
172. 6:56including Sequoia Capital, Thrive
173. 6:58Capital, Greylock Partners, and
174. 7:00Benchmark. That round valued the company
175. 7:03at around $500 million.
176. 7:05It was a stunning number for a company
177. 7:07with a staff you could count on two
178. 7:09hands. But Instagram's biggest moment of
179. 7:11that spring wasn't a funding round. On
180. 7:14April 3rd, 2012, Instagram finally
181. 7:17launched on Android. More than a million
182. 7:20people downloaded the app in less than a
183. 7:22day. Instagram wasn't an iPhone
184. 7:24curiosity anymore. It was becoming a
185. 7:27global phenomenon.
186. 7:29And that's exactly when Mark Zuckerberg
187. 7:31got worried. Facebook was about to go
188. 7:33public in one of the biggest IPOs in
189. 7:36history. But at the same time,
190. 7:38Zuckerberg could see something
191. 7:39troubling. Photos were the heart of
192. 7:42Facebook, and now a tiny startup was
193. 7:44winning the mobile photo race with a
194. 7:47loyal, fast-growing audience that loved
195. 7:49the product. Zuckerberg's own words in
196. 7:52internal emails, which became public
197. 7:54years later, made his thinking clear. He
198. 7:57saw Instagram as a threat that could
199. 7:59hurt Facebook, and he believed it was
200. 8:01better to buy it than to compete with
201. 8:03it. So, he called Kevin, and within days
202. 8:06a deal came together. On April 9th,
203. 8:082012, Facebook announced it was
204. 8:11acquiring Instagram for $1 billion in
205. 8:13cash and stock. Instagram had around 30
206. 8:16million users, 13 employees, and no
207. 8:19revenue. Zuckerberg promised to let
208. 8:22Instagram keep running independently,
209. 8:24which was very important to Kevin and
210. 8:25Mike. Here's a twist, though. Because
211. 8:28Facebook's stock fell after its IPO, the
212. 8:31deal was worth closer to $700 million by
213. 8:34the time it closed that September.
214. 8:36Still, Kevin owned a large share of the
215. 8:38company and walked away with hundreds of
216. 8:41millions of dollars. Looking back, this
217. 8:44might be the greatest acquisition in
218. 8:45tech history. Kevin and Mike had turned
219. 8:48a failed check-in app into a
220. 8:49billion-dollar company in less than 2
221. 8:52years, and Facebook had just bought what
222. 8:54would become one of its most valuable
223. 8:56assets.
224. 8:58At first, Zuckerberg kept his promise.
225. 9:01Instagram stayed in its own office with
226. 9:03its own team and its own culture, and
227. 9:06Kevin continued to lead product
228. 9:07decisions. The company grew carefully,
229. 9:10and it focused on making the experience
230. 9:12better rather than squeezing out money.
231. 9:15The year after the acquisition,
232. 9:17Instagram made some major moves. In
233. 9:19December 2012, a change to Instagram's
234. 9:22terms of service sparked panic. Users
235. 9:24believed the company was claiming the
236. 9:26right to sell their photos in ads. The
237. 9:29backlash was huge, and people threatened
238. 9:31to leave. Instagram quickly reversed
239. 9:34course and apologized. It was an early
240. 9:36lesson in how emotionally attached
241. 9:38people were to the app. In 2013,
242. 9:41Instagram added video, giving users 15
243. 9:44seconds to record clips. This was a
244. 9:47direct answer to a rival app called
245. 9:49Vine. That same year, it introduced
246. 9:52Instagram Direct for private messaging
247. 9:54and began to show ads for the first
248. 9:56time. Brands loved it.
249. 9:58Instagram's beautiful visual feed was
250. 10:01perfect for advertising and Facebook's
251. 10:03powerful ad technology made it easy to
252. 10:06target the right audience. The numbers
253. 10:08kept climbing. By the end of 2014,
254. 10:11Instagram passed 300 million monthly
255. 10:14users, overtaking Twitter, then 400
256. 10:17million, then 500. In 2016, the app
257. 10:22switched from a simple chronological
258. 10:23feed to an algorithm that ranked posts
259. 10:26by what you'd care about most. That
260. 10:29change annoyed many users, but it made
261. 10:31the feed stickier and the app got a new
262. 10:34look with a colorful gradient logo and a
263. 10:37flatter, cleaner design.
264. 10:40Meanwhile, a new competitor was rising.
265. 10:43Snapchat, with its disappearing photos
266. 10:45and fun camera effects, was winning over
267. 10:48teenagers.
268. 10:49Zuckerberg had actually tried to buy
269. 10:51Snapchat back in 2013,
270. 10:53reportedly for $3 billion. Snapchat's
271. 10:57founder, Evan Spiegel, said no. So,
272. 11:00Facebook decided to beat Snapchat in a
273. 11:02different way. In August 2016, Instagram
274. 11:06launched Instagram Stories, a feature
275. 11:08that let you share photos and videos
276. 11:10that vanished after 24 hours.
277. 11:13It was almost a direct copy of
278. 11:15Snapchat's signature feature and Kevin
279. 11:17openly admitted where the idea came
280. 11:19from. He said Snapchat deserved credit
281. 11:22for inventing the format. It was a
282. 11:24brilliant and ruthless move. Instagram
283. 11:26already had hundreds of millions of
284. 11:28users and stories gave them a casual,
285. 11:31low-pressure way to share everyday
286. 11:33moments. Within months, millions were
287. 11:36using it every day. By 2017, more than
288. 11:39200 million people used Stories daily,
289. 11:42which was more than Snapchat's entire
290. 11:44app. Snapchat's growth stalled, and
291. 11:47Instagram's grew even faster. In June
292. 11:502018, Instagram reached 1 billion
293. 11:53monthly users. It had taken just 8
294. 11:56years. For comparison, Facebook took
295. 11:58about 8 years to reach its first
296. 12:00billion, too, but Instagram did it with
297. 12:03a fraction of the staff, and it did it
298. 12:05during a period when the whole world was
299. 12:07already online.
300. 12:09But behind the scenes, a different story
301. 12:11was unfolding. As Instagram became more
302. 12:14important to Facebook, Zuckerberg and
303. 12:16his team grew more involved. The
304. 12:18independence that Kevin and Mike were
305. 12:20promised was slowly shrinking. Reports
306. 12:23described growing tension over how much
307. 12:25control Facebook had over Instagram's
308. 12:27product decisions, and over how its
309. 12:29resources were being used. On September
310. 12:3224th, 2018, Kevin Systrom and Mike
311. 12:36Krieger announced they were stepping
312. 12:38down.
313. 12:39They said they planned to take some time
314. 12:41off, explore their curiosity, and build
315. 12:44something new. Everyone in tech
316. 12:46understood what that really meant. The
317. 12:48founders who'd built one of the most
318. 12:50successful apps in history no longer
319. 12:52felt they could run it the way they
320. 12:53wanted. Adam Mosseri, a long-time
321. 12:56Facebook executive, took over Instagram.
322. 12:59Not long after, Facebook began adding
323. 13:02its own branding to the app, and
324. 13:04Instagram became more tightly connected
325. 13:06with Facebook's other products. As for
326. 13:08the founders, they didn't stay away from
327. 13:11tech for long. Kevin and Mike launched a
328. 13:13personalized news app called Artifact,
329. 13:16which was eventually sold to Yahoo. Mike
330. 13:19Krieger later moved into the AI world,
331. 13:21joining Anthropic as its chief product
332. 13:24officer.
333. 13:25Instagram's next big threat came from a
334. 13:27familiar place, TikTok. With its endless
335. 13:31stream of short videos, was taking over
336. 13:33young people's attention in 2019 and
337. 13:362020. Instagram responded the way it
338. 13:39always had. In August 2020, it launched
339. 13:42Reels, a short video feature almost
340. 13:45identical to TikTok's. At first,
341. 13:47creators weren't sure. Instagram had
342. 13:49been built around photos, and many
343. 13:51long-time users didn't want a different
344. 13:53kind of app. But Mosseri made it clear
345. 13:56where things were headed. In 2021, he
346. 13:59said Instagram was no longer just a
347. 14:01photo-sharing app. Video, he explained,
348. 14:04was where the platform was going, and
349. 14:06Reels became a central part of the
350. 14:07experience, pushed in your feed, in your
351. 14:10explore page, and in your
352. 14:12recommendations.
353. 14:14This changed how people used Instagram.
354. 14:16Instead of mostly seeing posts from
355. 14:18friends, users increasingly saw content
356. 14:21from strangers, chosen by the algorithm.
357. 14:24It made the app more addictive and more
358. 14:26entertaining, and it brought in even
359. 14:29more advertising. But it also made
360. 14:31Instagram feel less personal, and some
361. 14:33long-time fans missed the old days.
362. 14:36As Instagram grew, so did the criticism.
363. 14:39In 2021, a former Facebook employee
364. 14:42named Frances Haugen leaked thousands of
365. 14:45internal documents. The reporting around
366. 14:47them revealed that the company's own
367. 14:49research had found that Instagram could
368. 14:51harm the mental health of some teenage
369. 14:53users, especially young girls struggling
370. 14:56with body image. The revelations sparked
371. 14:58outrage and led to a series of hearings
372. 15:01in the US Congress.
373. 15:03Facebook paused its plans for a version
374. 15:05of Instagram aimed at kids, and later in
375. 15:082021, Facebook rebranded its parent
376. 15:11company as Meta.
377. 15:12Over the following years, Instagram
378. 15:14introduced new safety tools, including
379. 15:17special teen accounts with stricter
380. 15:18privacy settings, and limits on who can
381. 15:21contact young users. At the same time,
382. 15:24regulators went after the way Instagram
383. 15:26came to be part of Meta in the first
384. 15:28place. The US Federal Trade Commission
385. 15:30sued, arguing that Facebook bought
386. 15:33Instagram and later WhatsApp to
387. 15:35eliminate competition. The case went to
388. 15:37trial in 2025 with Kevin Systrom himself
389. 15:41appearing as a witness.
390. 15:42But in late 2025, a federal judge ruled
391. 15:46in Meta's favor, finding that the
392. 15:48government hadn't proven Meta held an
393. 15:50illegal monopoly. Instagram stayed with
394. 15:52Meta.
395. 15:54Today, Instagram is far bigger than
396. 15:56anything Kevin and Mike could have
397. 15:58imagined on that October day in 2010. In
398. 16:012025, Meta announced that Instagram had
399. 16:04passed 3 billion monthly users. That's
400. 16:07more than a third of everyone on Earth.
401. 16:09It generates tens of billions of dollars
402. 16:11in revenue each year, and analysts have
403. 16:14valued it at hundreds of billions of
404. 16:15dollars, a stunning return on a $1
405. 16:18billion purchase. It created a whole new
406. 16:21profession, the influencer.
407. 16:24It changed how restaurants design their
408. 16:25menus, how stores design their windows,
409. 16:29how travelers pick their destinations,
410. 16:31and how brands talk to customers. Whole
411. 16:33careers, businesses, and even art forms
412. 16:36were born on Instagram.
413. 16:38So, what can we learn from Instagram's
414. 16:40story?
415. 16:41First, focus beats features. Burbn
416. 16:44failed because it tried to do
417. 16:45everything. Instagram succeeded because
418. 16:48it did one thing perfectly and cut
419. 16:50everything else. Second, listen to what
420. 16:53users do, not what they say. The
421. 16:56founders pivoted because they noticed
422. 16:58that people loved photos even when the
423. 17:00rest of the app wasn't working.
424. 17:02Third, timing matters. Instagram arrived
425. 17:05exactly when smartphone cameras got good
426. 17:08and when people were ready to share
427. 17:10their lives online. And finally, success
428. 17:13comes with a price. The founders gave up
429. 17:15control for security and scale and
430. 17:18eventually left the company they
431. 17:19created. Instagram's story is a reminder
432. 17:22that selling a company can mean losing
433. 17:24the ability to guide its future, no
434. 17:26matter how big the check is. A dog's
435. 17:28paw, a taco stand, and a simple filter
436. 17:31started it all. Now, a little more than
437. 17:34a decade later, billions of people are
438. 17:36scrolling through the world Kevin
439. 17:37Systrom and Mike Krieger built. That was
440. 17:40the entire history of Instagram.