Celebrities and influencers are furious at Instagram’s experiment with hiding likes, and some are threatening to stop posting on the app

• Instagram plans to test a feature that hides “like” counts on posts for some US users starting this week.
• Celebrities and influencers have expressed outrage with the experimental feature, arguing that it weakens their leverage over brand deals and promotions.
• But a few celebrities, including Kim Kardashian, have praised the decision.
• The feature has already been piloted in seven countries including Australia, Ireland, and Canada.

Instagram is testing a new feature in the US this week that could be its most controversial yet: hiding the number of “likes” on posts.

The new feature, announced by Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri on Friday, is being met with strong backlash, especially from many influencers and celebrities.

The feature has already been piloted in seven countries including Australia, Ireland, and Canada in recent months. When it was rolled out there, influencers complained that hiding likes would give them less leverage over brand deals and sponsored content.

Now, American celebrities are calling out the app for experimenting with removing likes, with some threatening to stop posting to Instagram. Others joked on Twitter about the proposed changes.

But some, including Kim Kardashian, have heralded Instagram’s decision as a boon to users’ mental health.

“We’re testing this because we want Instagram to be a place where people feel comfortable expressing themselves. This includes helping people to focus on the photos and videos they share, not how many likes they get,” a spokesperson for Facebook, which owns Instagram, told Business Insider.

Here’s what influencers and celebrities are saying about the new feature that hides likes on Instagram.

Nicki Minaj threatened to stop posting on Instagram if the feature were to take effect.

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Getty/Gilbert Carrasquillo

Minaj went on to speculate that Instagram was hiding likes to manipulate what posts users saw in their feed, regardless of how much engagement posts were getting.

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Jeff Kravitz/AMA2014/FilmMagic via Getty Images

Minaj apparently referred to the well-documented phenomenon of YouTube view counts fluctuating after videos are posted, which can happen when YouTube determines views come from bots or other fraudulent sources.

The rapper Juicy J predicted backlash against the change, tweeting that he expected people to leave Instagram and go “back to real life.”

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Mario Anzuoni/Reuters

Cardi B took to Instagram to protest the feature, arguing that removing likes wouldn’t make Instagram any less toxic because “the comments affect more than the likes.”

The rapper Rico Nasty said the decision to hide likes would “kill Instagram.”

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Monica Almeida/Reuters

But some people, including Kim Kardashian West, view the decision to hide likes as a good thing.

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Slaven Vlasic/Getty

“As far as mental health, I mean it’s something that taking the likes away and taking that aspect away from it would be really beneficial for people,” Kardashian West said during The New York Times’ DealBook conference last week.

Tracee Ellis Ross also voiced support for removing likes, saying the like count had “adverse effects.” “It creates a culture that isn’t helpful for well-being and isn’t fruitful for creative energy,” she said.

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Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images

Ross made the statement last week during a panel discussion with Mosseri facilitated by Wired.

And some influencers have argued that the number of likes on a post is irrelevant compared with other metrics like follower counts and impressions.

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This is how Instagram posts appear with like counts hidden.

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Instagram

Karen Civil, a social-media strategist, made the case that influencers shouldn’t pay too much attention to how many likes their posts got.