'Instagram Purge' explained as Kylie Jenner loses over 5 million followers overnight

Concerns have been raised by Instagram users following reports that Kylie Jenner lost over 5 million followers overnight.

At one point, the day prior, the 28-year-old boasted a staggering 390,191,270 followers on the snap-sharing app.

Social media experts reported earlier today (7 May), however, that this figure had dropped to a still impressive, but considerably lower, 385 million.

Data from Social Blade alleges that the lip kit star's follower count decreased by exactly 5,071,791 on Wednesday evening.

It's likely that the news came as quite a blow to Jenner, who is the second most-followed woman on the platform, narrowly behind actress and singer Selena Gomez.

(Social Blade)

She wasn't the only Keeping Up with the Kardashians star to lose a considerable amount of their Instagram followers, however. Her big sister, Kim, also dropped an almighty 5,109,246 on the same day.

Outside of the world of reality TV, footballer Cristiano Ronaldo's follower count also reduced by around 6,622,220.

In fact, it wasn't just big-name celebs that suffered a hit to their followers, but ordinary folk.

One concerned Reddit user wrote today: "I lost 300 followers right after getting to 11K."

Another claimed: "Lost 1.5K followers, wanted to complain, then I came here to confirm it wasn’t only me."

The enigma has even been given a nickname - the 'Great Purge of 2026'.

Kim also lost a sizeable amount of her followers (Instagram/@kimkardashian)

Despite initial concerns surrounding a potential internal glitch, Instagram bosses at Meta later revealed that it all formed part of a global cull aimed at wiping out bot accounts that were clogging up the app.

"As part of our routine process to remove inactive accounts, some Instagram accounts may have noticed updates to their follower counts," a spokesperson told Tyla. "Active followers remain unaffected, and any restored suspended account will be added back in after verification."

Other A-listers believed to have had their follower count hit the hardest, including the official Instagram page of the K-pop band BLACKPINK, which apparently lost approximately 10 million followers.

Grande's follower count was also dramatically slashed (Instagram/@arianagrande)

Such was also the case for the boy band BTS, which suffered a blow of around 7 million.

Musician and Wicked star Ariana Grande is understood to have lost a similar figure to Jenner in the colossal purge, while sports star Lionel Messi's count fell by around 5 million.