How Hard Is It to Earn an Instagram Verification Badge?

During your routine scroll on Instagram, you decide to check out the latest post from your favorite singer, Ariana Grande. Upon typing her name into the search bar, you click on her account. Obviously, Ariana Grande is an A-list celebrity, so how do you know that it’s truly her? It’s simple. With a bright blue checkmark next to the username, Instagram tells you that the page in question is, in fact, THE Ariana Grande. As many of you know, this is called verification. How hard is it to obtain? Let’s talk about it. 

As defined by Instagram, “A verified badge is a check that appears next to an Instagram account’s name in search and on the profile. It means Instagram has confirmed that an account is the authentic presence of the public figure, celebrity or global brand it represents.” Verification is typically used to confirm prominent personalities’ identities in an attempt to reduce impersonation issues. 

Typically, this right is reserved exclusively for high profile entities, namely those with a large online presence. The following represents their criteria (via Instagram support).

• Authentic: Your account must represent a real person, registered business, or entity.
• Unique: Your account must be the unique presence of the person or business it represents. Only one account per person or business may be verified, with exceptions for language-specific accounts. We don’t verify general interest accounts (example: @puppymemes).
• Complete: Your account must be public and have a bio, profile photo and at least one post. Your profile can’t contain “add me” links to other social media services.
• Notable: Your account must represent a well-known, highly searched for person, brand, or entity. We review accounts featured in multiple news sources, and we don’t consider paid or promotional content as sources for review.

The point of interest comes from the last bulletin point titled “notable.” If your presence hasn’t been written about in large press outlets (New York Times, Entrepreneur, Forbes, etc.), you’re fighting a losing battle. As Instagram’s popularity has increased exponentially over the past few years, the prereqs for now coveted badge have become extremely difficult to meet. If one is interested in Instagram verification, they must have a long history of public notoriety.

 If you’re still reading, you likely believe that your current online presence is enough to meet Instagram’s standards, and you’re probably wondering where to go from there. Put simply; you need a connection to the internal support team. Instagram offers a verification form through the app itself. Still, the volume of requests that they receive has led to them implementing an auto denial system, which likely would have your request rejected by a bot. 

Only a select few of the applications can access the main center of Instagram support, so you’ll have to have a communication channel with an employee of some sort. These connections are typically found with agents and other social media managers who manage high-level entities. 

In short, Instagram verification is extremely tough. With a mixture of challenging requirements and a difficult path to approval, it’s no simple task. However, it’s clearly not impossible, as thousands of accounts tote a blue checkmark to this day!