Tired of curating the perfect social media feed? Then you’ll like Gen Z’s latest trend.
Some young people are intentionally uploading photos to Instagram, immediately archiving them and resharing them days later. The post still shows up on their profile, but those posts don't necessarily appear on their followers' feeds. It’s called “ghost posting.”
Instagram first added the archive feature in 2017, intended as a way for users to remove photos without needing to permanently delete them. But the feature has taken on a new prominence as young people look to regulate and take more control over their relationship with social media and how their content appears online.
Users can archive on Instagram by tapping the post you want to hide, tapping the three
dots (options) in the top-right corner and selecting "Archive" from the menu. TikTok is filled with tutorials on how to use archives to create a “lowkey post” or filler content for a user’s feed.
“When my Insta archive finally hits 5 days so now I can show my profile,” one user posted. “How I feel posting an IG pic, archiving it right away, waiting 4 days and then putting it back on my profile,” reads one TikTok with the caption “Takes away the pressure for real.” “Coming back from a Europe trip and archivemaxxing,” reads another.
What's the point of ‘ghost posting’?
In the same vein as Finstas (fake, secondary or private Instagram accounts) and Stories only shared with close friends, young people are pushing back on solely using social media as a place to see and be seen. With the ghost post, there’s no engagement, and that’s the point.
In 2021, Instagram started letting users decide if they want to hide the number of "likes" on other users' posts and hide the feature on their own posts, giving users a way to make metrics a smaller part of the experience. Ghost posting has become an extension of that, helping decrease the feelings of insecurity or stress than can come with posting online.
Riley Meyer, 19, says her thought process behind archiving and restoring a photo is that she wants the post on her Instagram grid, but believes it is not “main post worthy,” or worth everyone seeing it on their feed.
“I think it removes the pressure of posting,” Meyer says. “The whole point is to curate your account and add to the aesthetic.”
What ‘ghost posting’ says about Gen Z
From the rehearsed − and mocked − Gen Z pout to the polished "influencer accent" that have flooded TikTok’s For You Page, young people place a lot of focus on constantly editing themselves and avoiding anything that might come off as try-hard, awkward or embarrassing.
An April Yahoo/YouGov poll found that more than half of adult Gen Zers say they've steered clear of expressing themselves online for fear of coming across as "cringe."
“There is a pressure amongst Gen Z to always appear authentic, but not authentic to the point where you could be considered cringe,” 24-year-old Morgan Hurlock previously told USA TODAY. “You're expected to sort of know how to do everything and be perfect the first go around at something.”
The rise of ghost-posting reflects Gen Z’s desire to take the pressure off in another area of their lives.
Roughly 1 in 5 U.S. teens say they're on TikTok and YouTube “almost constantly,” and roughly half of teens report visiting Instagram every day, according to Pew Research.
As the first generation to grow up entirely online, Gen Z came of age “comparing and despairing,” Don Grant, a media psychologist and National Advisor of Healthy Device Management for Newport Healthcare, previously told USA TODAY.
“We learn about ourselves and where we stand in the world only from the reactions and responses we get from others,” explained Grant. For Gen Z and Gen Alpha, that public sphere is online. “They grew up with everything online becoming their social currency and the litmus of who they are.”
Ghost posting offers them some agency as well as a small way to interrupt that feedback loop without doing away with social media altogether.
Meyers has tried to break away a bit from the “likes” on her feed. She generally keeps her like count turned off these days.
“I originally start with my like count turned off, and if (a post) does OK, I will sometimes turn it on. I want to post what makes me happy without the… thought of ‘Is this post doing well?” Meyer says.
Rachel Hale’s role covering Youth Mental Health at USA TODAY is supported by a partnership with Pivotal and Journalism Funding Partners. Funders do not provide editorial input.
Reach her at rhale@usatoday.com and @rachelleighhale on X.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What is ‘ghost posting’? Why Gen Z is hiding their Instagram posts
