The '2026 is the New 2016' Instagram Trend: A Deep Dive

Instagram (Image source: Reuters) In early 2026, a noticeable trend has started on major social media sites: people are going back to the visual and cultural style of 2016. People are posting old photos, videos, and digital memories with filters and editing styles that look a lot like things from ten years ago. A lot of posts on social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and X talk about things that were popular in the past, like events, fashion choices, and how people used the internet. This trend is called ‘2026 is the new 2016’. According to the BBC reports, searches for "2016" on TikTok rose by 452% in the first two weeks of January 2026. The rise shows that more people want to go back to a time when many users think social media was more creative and it was easier to talk to people online. The trend includes both personal archives and new content that looks like media from that time. How the ‘2026 is the new 2016’ trend appears on social media platforms People are posting pictures and short videos on TikTok and Instagram that have hazy filters, muted colours, and lower image quality. This is where the trend is most clear. These changes make the photos look like they were taken with early smartphone cameras or social media apps from 2016. People often see things like carved eyebrows, Snapchat puppy filters, mirror selfies, and screenshots of people playing Pokémon Go in public. More than 56 million videos have been made on TikTok using filters that are based on the 2016 aesthetic. A lot of creators are going back to old phone galleries, while others are using new devices to recreate scenes but adding effects that make them less sharp and more grainy. Celebrities participating in the trend Many famous people from all over the world have also joined the trend by posting old pictures and videos from 2016. Popular personalities like Selena Gomez, Alia Bhatt, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Kylie Jenner, Taylor Swift, Ananya Panday, and many others have taken part by posting "throwback" content. A lot of people have seen these posts, which has helped the trend get more attention and spread. Celebrities have helped older music, fashion, and social media styles come back into style online. User reactions and online responses A lot of people have left comments about how they remember that time. One person wrote on X, “Would love to return to life in 2016,” and another wrote, “Man, what a time to be alive.” These kinds of posts often come with pictures or videos from personal archives, which suggests that users are using social media to publicly look back on their own pasts, not just on bigger pop culture events. The reason behind the renewed interest There seems to be a renewed interest in 2016, which comes at the same time as bigger changes in the global and digital world since then. A lot of things happened after 2016, such as the coronavirus pandemic, new leaders in some countries, and the rapid growth of AI tools on social media. Some people seem to be going back to older digital experiences to remember what it was like to talk to people online before social media became more automated and commercialised. The trend doesn't show that 2016 was trouble-free; it shows how time can change how people remember things as a group. A shared digital memory experience People are sharing memories and trying to look like they did in the past more and more, which is making the "2026 is the new 2016" trend grow. People from all walks of life, from everyday people to celebrities, are getting involved. This shows how popular familiar digital styles are. People can share pictures, music, and other things on social media to look back on and change things that have happened recently. Everyone is interacting with a version of the past that has been changed by technology, memory, and how people act online. This is because they are using old content and new graphics. The trend shows how digital platforms let people save, change, and relive things from earlier parts of the internet age in real time. End of Article