Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger co-founded Instagram in 2010 as a photo-sharing service.
Systrom and Krieger initially worked on Burbn, a location-based mobile application that included check-ins, plans, and photo sharing. They simplified the concept after noticing that users especially liked the photo feature. The resulting service, Instagram, launched in October 2010 for Apple’s iPhone.
The name combined “instant” and “telegram,” reflecting the idea of quickly sharing images. Instagram gained users rapidly and introduced filters that made mobile photography more distinctive. Its early growth was driven by the iPhone app before an Android version arrived in 2012.
Facebook announced its agreement to acquire Instagram in April 2012. Instagram continued operating as a separate service under Facebook, now Meta. Burbn was the founders’ earlier project, not Instagram’s public name, so the two should not be treated as separate founding companies.