After Instagram
- 11%Founded something15
- 14%Joined a startup20
- 35%Joined a big company48
- 40%Elsewhere
Shares of those who moved on, by their next stop.
People who leave Instagram most often go to Meta, Google and Palantir Technologies. 11% found something next. 14% go small. Median stay 2y 8m
These are the engineers in the Zelcast network and the profiles run through the Eng Scorer, not Instagram's headcount: 198 people on a map of 26,572, the No. 45 company on it by people. Updated August 20, 2026.
- People on the map
- 1980.7% of everyone on the map
- There now
- 5829% of the people here
- Moved on
- 14071% of the people here
- Median tenure
- 2y 8mmiddle half 1y 7m to 4y 9m
Put Instagram side by side with another company, every number against every number.
Came from, went to
Ribbon width is the number of people who made the move. Most arrive from Meta. Most leave for Meta (28% of recorded departures).
101 of 191 recorded arrivals shown, 90 more from 81 other companies58 of 141 recorded departures shown, 83 more to 72 other companies
The Instagram mafia
15 of the people who left went straight to a founding role, 11% of those who moved on, half of them the same month they left. The bars are the ’15 to ’26 classes; earlier founders count in the total.
How long people stay
13%<1y
23%1-2y
31%2-4y
28%4-7y
6%7y+
160 stays with both a start and an end on the record.
Who comes and goes, by year
0012
4113
1114
4115
7316
16617
201518
311519
351720
302321
343822
101623
91024
6525
1126
joined left2026 is a partial year
2012 to 2026: 208 joined, 152 left.
Caliber
85mediantop 10%94
0Eng Scorer caliber, 198 scored99
there now 84 moved on 86. The people who left score higher than the people still there.
Titles held here
- Software Engineer83
- Software Engineer Intern43
- Senior Software Engineer26
- Engineering Manager21
- Staff Software Engineer17
- Machine Learning Engineer7
- Data Engineer6
- Product Manager5
8 most common titles, by people who held them.
Behind the median
Everyone here with an Eng Scorer read, placed in their caliber tier.
- 9%Exceptional17 people
- 36%Strong70 people
- 46%Solid90 people
- 10%Emerging or unproven20 people
197 of the 198 people here carry an Eng Scorer tier.
Exceptional and strong are the top two of the five tiers. 87 of the 197 people here with a read sit in them, 44%. A tier is the band an Eng Scorer caliber score falls in, so this is the same measurement as the median on the caliber card, opened up. A tier holding fewer than 3 people is printed together with the one next to it, because a bucket that small is a person rather than a pattern.
Whether a title rose here
The level of the first title recorded here, against the last.
45%Titles that rose72 of 160 classified people
- 45%Rose72 people
- 55%Stayed level or fell88 people
160 of the 198 people here had a title that could be placed on the ladder before and after.
A title rose when the last title recorded here sits higher on the ladder than the first; for someone who recorded one title here and then left, it is measured against the first title of their next role. The ladder runs intern, junior, mid, senior, staff or manager, principal, director, VP, then founder or C-level. A title that matches no rung is left out rather than guessed, and product, program and project managers are left out entirely, being a different ladder. That leaves 160 of the 198 people here classified, and it leans towards people who have left: someone still here on a single recorded title has nothing to be measured against. A direction holding fewer than 3 people is printed together with the one next to it, because a bucket that small is a person rather than a pattern.
Where they studied
- University of Waterloo11.7%
- Stanford9.1%
- UC Berkeley8.6%
- MIT5.6%
- NYU5.6%
- Harvard5.1%
- UCLA4.6%
- Carnegie Mellon3.6%
The 8 most listed schools among the 197 people here with a school on file.
Of the 197 people here with a school on file, 23 list University of Waterloo, 18 list Stanford and 17 list UC Berkeley. A person can list more than one school, so these overlap rather than add up.
Public work
one square is one in a hundred
51%have a public GitHub account on their profile
100 of the 197 people here whose profile was checked for public accounts. An account the check did not find reads the same as no account, so this is a floor rather than a census.
Across the 325 companies on the map that can show this figure, the median is 38%.
Where they are now
53% of the people who have worked at Instagram and list a location live in New York today, against 33% of everyone on the map.
Instagram
Everyone on the map
- 53%New York105 · map 33%
- 42%SF Bay Area83 · map 47%
- 3%Los Angeles6 · map 6%
- 2%Somewhere else3
197 of the 198 people who worked at Instagram list a location, and every share here is over those 197.
Where they live now, from the profile as it reads today, not where they sat while they worked at Instagram: a metro here does not mean the company has an office in it. The lower strip is the same metros across the whole map, for comparison.
On the same resumes
Companies that show up most often alongside Instagram, at any point in a career.
Key facts
- 198 people on the Zelcast alumni map have worked at Instagram: 58 are there now and 140 have moved on.
- The most common next employer after Instagram is Meta (39 people, 28% of recorded departures), followed by Google and Palantir Technologies.
- The most common previous employer before Instagram is Meta (70 people), followed by Amazon and Google.
- The median tenure at Instagram is 2y 8m (middle half 1y 7m to 4y 9m).
- Of those who moved on from Instagram, 11% went on to a founder title, 14% joined a company with 200 or fewer people, and 35% joined a company with 10,000 or more.
- The median Eng Scorer caliber of people who have worked at Instagram is 85 on the 0 to 99 scale (198 scored).
- The most common title held at Instagram is Software Engineer, then Software Engineer Intern.
- Of the 197 people here with a school on file, 23 list University of Waterloo (11.7%), then Stanford (18). A person can list more than one school, so these overlap rather than add up.
- 53% of the 197 people here who list a location live in New York today, against 33% of everyone on the map. That is where they live now, not the office they sat in while they worked here.
- 51% of the 197 people here whose profile was checked for public accounts have a public GitHub account on it.
About this data: built from 144,786 jobs across 26,572 engineers in the Zelcast network and Eng Scorer reads, updated August 20, 2026. A move counts when the next role starts within 24 months of leaving; companies with fewer than 20 people on the map are not shown, and destinations with fewer than 3 people are folded into the totals. Caliber is the Eng Scorer score.
Worked at Instagram? See how your profile reads to a startup hiring manager, and where it ranks among 26,572 engineers.
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