TechCrunch: Instagram Surges Past 600 Million Users, Fueled by Algorithmic Feed

Instagram has continued to flex its innovation muscles in the last year. The Facebook-owned photo sharing app has announced an algorithmic newsfeed, Stories, bookmarks, live video, zoom and more. According to a recent TechCrunch article , the changes are not only flashy but effective with its newly announced growth in user base currently sitting at 600 million monthly active users.

This newly recorded number is 100 million higher than it was six months ago and accounts for 10% of the world’s population. Instagram is not only seeing growth, but is continuing to see accelerated growth as it took around nine months to go from 400 million to 500 million monthly active users.

Recent chances have enhanced the user experience and given people a reason to keep coming back to the app. Between watching stories and the new algorithmic feed showing users the content they want to see makes for more frequent app visits and longer time spent on the app.

As with Facebook, users were initially upset over the algorithmic feed and didn’t trust that Instagram would show them what they wanted to see. The numbers are putting those complaints to rest as it appears that growth and retention are in fact improving.