From Facebook to LinkedIn to Reddit, it seems that every few years a new social media platform pops up, dominating attention and becoming an internet star. The latest contender is OnlyFans.
While you've undoubtedly heard of OnlyFans before, you might be wondering what exactly it's used for. Here, we'll take a look at just that.
What Is OnlyFans?
OnlyFans is a social media content subscription service. It charges subscribers a recurring fee for access to its content. This content includes images, recorded and live videos, direct messages, and sometimes even merchandise.
OnlyFans is most well-known for NSFW content, and has become a very popular app for the adult entertainment industry. Unfortunately, this content means that OnlyFans is not available on any mobile app stores.
Instead, you'll have to visit OnlyFans with a browser on either a desktop or mobile device. On mobile devices, you can save the webpage to your home screen. This will create an additional app icon on your home screen, allowing you to access OnlyFans like an app.
In order to access any content on OnlyFans, you must first set up an account. Setting up an account is quick and free, but you must be over 18 years old. You must subscribe to a creator's account and pay that creator a fee to view the content they have put up, unless the creator's account is specifically set up to allow free access.
Fans will pay anywhere from a minimum fee of $4.99 to a maximum fee of $49.99 per month to access a creator's content. You also have the option to tip creators to purchase additional content from them, or just as to give a gift. The minimum tip is $5 and the maximum tip is $100.
What Content Will You Find on OnlyFans?
There are four main types of content available on OnlyFans: videos, photos, direct messages, and status updates. Like most social media platforms, photos and videos are the most popular with the fans, especially where adult entertainment is concerned.
Updates work just like Facebook posts. All the creators have to do is to type out a message on their keyboard and post it to their OnlyFans page to engage the fans.
As we touched upon, the majority of OnlyFans content (estimated to be around 70-80 percent) is created by adult entertainers and sex workers. The content can range from mildly flirtatious to X-rated content.
The rest of the content on the platform is completely clean. This content consists of videos from Hollywood actors, musicians, fitness trainers, influencers, journalists, filmmakers, and small businesses, among others.
Some popular non-sexual creators include Duke and Jones, who use OnlyFans to promote their content and to support COVID-19 charities, American rapper Swae Lee, and The Plastic Boy sharing step-by-step makeup and skincare regimes.
Of course, not all OnlyFans users are well-known individuals, anyone can have an account. If you take a look around, there's no shortage of creators you can support.
OnlyFans seems determined to go mainstream in non-sexual content, as it also launched a SFW-only app called OnlyFans TV (OFTV).
Rather than the paid subscription model, OFTV allows free access to everyone. So far, OFTV has over 800 videos from more than 100 creators. The videos cover all SFW content from the old site, everything from exercise to vlogs to fashion to cooking to meditation.
What Does the Future Look Like for OnlyFans?
OnlyFans is still relatively new, and the jury is still out on whether it will catch up to the popular social media apps we use on a daily basis.
While it might be hard to compete in a saturated social media market, there's no denying the impact and prevalence the app has for sex workers.