Instagram: Instagram’s copy-paste job of TikTok’s biggest feature is raking in billions of dollars

“No two products are exactly alike, and ours are not either” is what a senior Instagram executive said in August 2020. He was talking about Reels — a feature/format that was made popular by TikTok. It was something that Instagram had said about Stories as well, something that Snapchat started. Of course, it’s TikTok and Reels aren’t identical twins. But it won’t be inaccurate to say that Reels is massively inspired by TikTok and Facebook (as it was known then) did an excellent copy-paste job and added its own touch. Reels are now what Instagram is all about. First Reels, then Stories, and then photos. That’s right, a photo-sharing platform is not about photos anymore. And you really can’t blame Meta or Instagram for that.

200 billion. Yes, that’s the number of Reels “plays” that happen on Instagram and Facebook. Actually, it is more than 200 billion. This is what Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an investors’ call. “Reels plays exceed 200 billion per day across Facebook and Instagram.”

Reels are reeling in the cash

That’s not all. Reels is making Meta more money than ever before. Zuckerberg said that monetisation from Reels is showing a lot of progress. “We’re seeing good progress on Reels monetisation as well, with the annual revenue run-rate across our apps now exceeding $10 billion, up from $3 billion last fall.” Of course, this isn’t from Instagram alone but Facebook as well. So Reels is big on two platforms, though the company did not disclose the exact figures for either platforms.
Meta also said that three-fourth of its advertisers are now using Reels ads. “We remain focused on further reducing the Reels revenue headwind and narrowing the monetisation efficiency gap with our more mature surfaces,” said Susan Li, chief financial officer, Meta.“However, we continue to expect time on Reels will monetize at a lower rate than Stories and Feed for the foreseeable future since people scroll more slowly through video content,” she added. Mindless scrolling is certainly making Meta megabucks and TikTok can take some credit for that as well.