Instagram’s Popular Page Now Shows ‘Unpopular’ Random Photos

You may have noticed over the last week that many images on Instagram Explore Tab (which used to be called the popular page) have a minimal number of likes, but getting maximum exposure in this prominent section of the app.

This is a recent change by Instagram but hasn’t specifically been announced by the service.

You can still hit the popular page if your photo gathers a large number of likes in a short time, but from my research about two thirds of the images are popular, and one third random ‘unpopular’ images.

Also, according to the Instagram help site – some images may show on the Explore Tab/ Popular Page if you follow that particular user.

I have also noticed over the last year or so that the popular page itself hasn’t been as frequented by users as it previously was. This is from my own research and opinions – but due to the size of the Instagram user base can still attract a large audience.

I suspect Instagram and experimenting and slowing moving down this path and many people have been trying to game the system.

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