Key Takeaways
- Having been an active Instagram user, I decided to stop posting photos for a year.
- In the process, I deleted my old account.
- Several reasons led to this, such as burnout and a lack of creativity.
Instagram is the go-to place for photography, and you have to be on there as a photographer… right?
Well, I wanted to find this out for myself. Here’s why I stopped posting photos on Instagram for a year, which included permanently deleting my old account.
1 I Constantly Felt the Pressure to Post
This one is quite strange because I thought I had nixed this habit when taking my first lengthy break from Instagram in 2020. I was fine for a few years, but eventually, I started to play the “influencer” role (even though I had never previously enjoyed doing so). The primary reason why was because I started to take my photography more seriously, and—subsequently—post more frequently.
This started innocently enough, but eventually, it felt like I had to post a certain number of times each week. If not, the algorithm will forget about me… right? Blatantly ignoring that all of my posts got better engagement when I posted less frequently, but I digress.
The pressure to post was purely internal. I’m certain that most of my followers would not have cared if I didn’t post a photo for a few weeks or even a few months, and speaking from my perspective, I’d rather follow someone who posts higher-quality content less frequently (more on this later).
If you’re starting to feel like you have to be online, I strongly recommend quitting all social media for a while.
2 I Became Disillusioned With Instagram’s Changes at the Time
When I decided to stop posting my photos on Instagram for a year, it was around that time when the app was making major changes. Reels had become the priority, and I noticed a significant drop in engagement on my photos. This move disgruntled me because I mainly joined Instagram to post pictures. Heck, I even jumped on the short-lived “switching from Instagram to VERO” bandwagon.
I also class myself as the type of person whose actions should match their beliefs. The simple matter here is that if you don’t like what a social media platform is doing, you don’t have to use it. I was no longer enjoying the Instagram experience, so it felt like checking out was the best thing to do at that time.
3 I Was Wasting Time
When I first started thinking about not posting on Instagram, it mainly came from me wasting my time on the app. This wasn’t necessarily about scrolling, although that was part of it. More specifically, the strategic aspects of posting on Instagram consumed more of my bandwidth than they should have.
I take responsibility here, but it always felt like I had to post an interesting caption—even though the reality is that I’d rather have just posted my picture and then left the app. Copywriting took hours, and I would waste a lot of time thinking of captions just because I wanted to post something.
Soon after my decision to stop posting on Instagram (and delete my account), I instantly felt a surge of creativity. My photography skills have never accelerated as quickly as they did during that period; if you want to get better at taking pictures, spending all your time creating an Instagram strategy isn’t going to do that.
If you’re using Instagram for any other creative project, I can categorically tell you that you’re better off focusing on a higher-leverage task. For example, I run a travel blog. As you can see from my all-time statistics below, I get very little traffic from Instagram.
4 I Was Always Rushing My Edits
Many photographers hate editing, but I am not one of them. I love fine-tuning my pictures to look exactly how I want them to. If you look at my Instagram account these days, you’ll notice that I normally don’t upload my pictures until months after taking them.
I don’t edit immediately because a) I take so many pictures, and b) I want to create some distance to edit with a logical mind. While posting frequently on Instagram, I always rushed my edits. The results were sloppy, and I hated how they looked.
I actually caught myself doing this again after returning to the app, and I subsequently reduced my output workload to focus on quality. I suggest doing the same if you’re in this predicament, especially if you’re just doing your creative work as a hobby.
5 I Was Burnt Out From Using Instagram
In the same way that you can get burnt out if you don’t take a break from work or exercise, I think that you can also suffer burnout from using social media (and other forms of technology) for extended periods. I’ve been using Instagram for the best part of a decade, and when I opted to stop posting photos for a year, I had been back on the app for two years without a break.
Every six months or so, taking a complete social media break for a week or two is a good idea. You don’t have to delete your accounts, but you should at the very least remove the apps from your phone. Taking time off will make it easier for you to enjoy more of the benefits of social media.
6 I Was Taking Photos Solely for Instagram
A surefire sign that you need to stop posting photos on Instagram is if you’re taking photos solely for the app, and this is the exact situation I found myself in. Every picture was in portrait orientation, even if there was a landscape shot that I thought would look cool. When editing, I was also thinking about how the picture would look on my feed.
My creativity increased so much after choosing not to post because I was taking photos for the joy of capturing images. Photography is by far my biggest passion, and I initially fell in love with it because I was capturing whatever looked cool. If you’re taking pictures just for an app, you’ll lose that (and funnily enough, you’ll fail to stand out because your images won’t be unique).
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with posting your favorite pictures on Instagram, but I definitely should not have been taking photos just to potentially pop off on the algorithm.
7 I Wanted to Critically Assess My Instagram Usage as a Photographer
Since joining social media when I was young, I never stopped and critically assessed my usage before quitting. To me, it was just something that I always did (and that everyone else in society also did). From a photographer’s perspective, I wanted to stop and ask whether Instagram was truly serving me—which is why I stopped posting for a full year.
After stepping back, I started asking serious questions and analyzing my attitude towards the app. One revelation that sounds obvious now, but was a big revelation at the time, was this:
If a lack of likes and engagement alone stopped me from taking photos, it suggested that I didn’t actually like photography and instead wanted validation.
I also wanted to ask myself if Instagram was something I even wanted to use. In my opinion, the idea that you need any social media to succeed in a creative endeavor is simply not true. It can be a useful tool, but there are plenty of other ways to get your name out there. And as a hobbyist, you might prefer creating your own website to share what you make.
As you probably can gather from the fact I have my Instagram account in my bio, I ultimately returned to Instagram. Instead of trying to be an influencer, I decided to use the account to simply connect with like-minded people and casually share my pictures. The overwhelming majority of my photos are on my travel blog, and I’m happy with this balance.
