Instagram is bringing back its in-house creator awards program, “Rings,” for a second year, naming a judging panel that includes Donatella Versace, A$AP Rocky, designer Emily Adams Bode Aujla, FINNEAS, director Chloé Zhao, skier Mikaela Shiffrin, artist duo OSGEMEOS, Instagram Head Adam Mosseri, choreographer Charm La’Donna, Instagram Head of Fashion Partnerships Eva Chen, former GQ Editor-in-Chief Will Welch, makeup artist Isamaya Ffrench, chef Vikas Khanna, and creator Jack Edwards, according to Instagram’s announcement. The full list of winners will be revealed later this month.

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The judges will both nominate and select this year’s honorees, a process Instagram frames as a deliberate alternative to algorithmic ranking. “[The winners are] artists who are on their way to becoming iconic in their fields, chosen by fellow icons, and so it’s not chosen by an algorithm; it is chosen by people in the fields and who are out there in the world who are discovering and inspired by what their peers are doing on Instagram, and so the thing that we are not centering this around is follower count,” Chen told The Hollywood Reporter.

Winners will again receive a physical ring, this year designed by judge Emily Adams Bode Aujla, who built the piece around a four-leaf clover cut from Connemara marble. Instagram’s announcement ties the design to Bode Aujla’s view that honorees “make their own luck” through bold creative choices, a pattern she says mirrors what psychologists find in people considered lucky. Last year’s ring, by contrast, was designed by Grace Wales Bonner.

A Larger Pool, More Digital Tools

Chen told The Hollywood Reporter that the pool of winners will grow from 25 last year to 50 this year, and that the program’s digital component will expand beyond the gold ring that appears around a winner’s profile picture and stories. The 2025 edition gave honorees a golden profile ring, the ability to customize their profile backdrop color, custom “like” button options, and featured placement in an in-app spotlight, per Instagram’s original announcement at the time. 

Tech reviewer Marques Brownlee, one of last year’s judges, described the appeal of that package in terms of standing rather than income: “It’s more about a special visibility and sort of incentive for people to work towards a really cool elevated recognition,” he stated at the time.

Chen described “Rings” as a multi-year bet on building a connected community of honorees rather than a single annual moment. “One of our goals for this program is year-over-year for you to feel like you are part of this community of people, and so to me, this program will be a success if a year one winner strikes up a conversation with a year two winner, and they exchange numbers or they start DMing and they collab on something together,” she told The Hollywood Reporter. “That sense of connection and community is one of I think the goals for this program.”

She also said the judging panel was built deliberately across disciplines. “We really wanted to have this global mix of people who are moving culture forward in their respective fields and beyond,” Chen said. “It’s people we think that are doing interesting things in the world as well as on Instagram, and who’ve charted their own course.”

Platforms Keep Building Their Own Trophies

“Rings” arrived in 2025 at a moment when Meta had already wound down the “Reels Play” bonus program on Instagram and Facebook, cutting off a direct income source for many creators, according to a CNBC report published at the time. That report noted “Rings” offers recognition and visibility rather than payment, a contrast to YouTube’s disclosure that it has paid creators more than $100 billion over the past four years.

Instagram is not alone in building an owned honors program for its creator base. TikTok held its first U.S. awards show in December 2025 at the Hollywood Palladium, handing out 14 awards under the theme “New Era, New Icons,” with Ciara headlining, eight presenters drawn from its own creator ranks, and e.l.f. Cosmetics as title sponsor. The ceremony streamed live on TikTok and on Tubi, the show’s official streaming partner, part of a global awards series the platform already runs in Korea, Japan, Australia, Brazil, the UK and Ireland. 

Snapchat announced its inaugural Snappys Awards Show in February 2026, with the ceremony scheduled for March 31 at its Santa Monica headquarters, hosted by comedian Matt Friend and honoring what it calls “Snap Stars” across categories including “Spotlight MVP,” “Best Storyteller” and “Breakout Creator of the Year,” while presenting DJ Khaled with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Jim Shepherd, the former Head of Content Partnerships at Snapchat, called the show part of the company’s “long-term commitment to giving creators meaningful recognition and real opportunity as they continue to define what’s next.”

The trend extends beyond the platforms themselves. In July 2026, the Critics Choice Association, which has run the Critics Choice Awards for more than three decades, launched its own Critics Choice Creator Awards, the first program built specifically around digital-native formats such as podcasts, micro-dramas and short-form scripted series, with categories splitting comedy and micro-drama into short-form and long-form tracks. CCA CEO Joey Berlin said the move reflects where the critic’s job now sits. “As the world of entertainment evolves and migrates onto social media and streaming platforms, it is the job of entertainment critics to move with them,” Berlin said.

Where TikTok’s and Snapchat’s shows lean on celebrity hosts, musical performances and sponsor tie-ins, and the CCA’s awards run through a traditional critics’ voting body, Instagram has positioned “Rings” around peer judging by names from outside the platform’s usual Creator Economy orbit, pairing Hollywood and fashion figures with Instagram’s own executives. 

Instagram has not disclosed financial terms, sponsorship details, or a broadcast component for this year’s program, and the company said it plans to announce the full winners list later in October.

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