Instagram is introducing Rings, a new global award designed to celebrate creators who “aren’t afraid to take creative chances and do it their way.”
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The award will honor 25 creators from around the world who have, according to Instagram, shifted culture and broken barriers through their work. Winners will receive both a physical gold ring designed by Grace Wales Bonner and a digital ring that appears around their Instagram profile photo, replacing the usual Stories ring for a full year.
They’ll also be able to customize their profile backdrop and design their own Like button, adding a new layer of personal expression on the platform.
“It’s not about content. It’s about a spirit.”
Meta describes Rings as a celebration of courage and creative risk-taking, of the “excitement and nervousness that come with making something and putting it out into the world.”
“It takes courage to chase an idea, quiet that inner critic, and create anyway,” the company wrote. “This award is for the creators who don’t just participate in culture, but shift it.”
To select the first 25 recipients, Instagram assembled a global panel of judges including Adam Mosseri, Spike Lee, Marc Jacobs, Yara Shahidi, Pat McGrath, and Marques Brownlee (MKBHD), among others.
While Rings feels positioned as the Oscars of social media, it notably doesn’t include any monetary reward. Instead, the focus is on cultural impact and creative courage, a symbolic recognition at a time when Meta has been scaling back its financial incentives for creators.
Over the past few years, Meta has shut down its Reels bonus program, ended profile ad payouts, and discontinued affiliate bonuses, even as creator brand deals reportedly fell 52% in 2024, according to Kajabi.
So, while the Rings award doesn’t pay in cash, it does cement recognition as currency, a visible sign of status in an ecosystem where visibility itself is value. Whether that’s enough to satisfy creators in an increasingly competitive and underfunded economy remains to be seen. But one thing’s clear: Instagram wants to remind the world it still knows who’s shaping culture.
