As I leave my house on an overcast Tuesday morning to walk the dog, I’m accosted by a neighbor who cheerily calls down the street: “I hear you have an OnlyFans now!” I start to wonder if I’ve made a terrible mistake.
OnlyFans has—how shall I put it—a reputation. Like many online platforms, it matches content creators with their audience. But OnlyFans is primarily known for one type of content: sex.
When friends and acquaintances hear I—a 43-year-old father of two—have set up an OnlyFans account, they are intrigued. When I explain I’m only posting content that’s nonsexual and very much safe for work, their next question is “Why?” In their minds, it’s clear that “having an OnlyFans” means doing sexy stuff on the internet, for money.
OnlyFans, a UK-based outfit that raked in $658 million in pretax profit last year, wants to shake this image. For every university student raising cash by sharing nudes, there’s a wholesome housewife uploading DIY tips or an up-and-coming musician posting his latest tracks, at least if you go by the accounts highlighted on the company’s blog.
“Everyone’s doing a dance on the rest of social media, where it’s like, ‘Hey, you’re not supposed to show people your penis here and you’re not supposed to say crazy, wild shit,’” John Hastings, a 39-year-old Canadian comic, tells me via phone from his home in Los Angeles. On OnlyFans however, he still has people who slide into his DMs just to say “I want to see your feet, I'm not here for jokes.”
Like all the safe-for-work creators I speak to, Hastings has a presence on many social networks, from Instagram to X to YouTube. The audience on OnlyFans will usually be smaller than on other sites, but followers are often more engaged and—importantly—must have a bank account linked to their profile, ready to be prized open.
“It is a different world, for sure, compared to the people who are on my other social media platforms,” says Dudley Alexander, an R&B artist who releases music under the moniker Nevrmind.
Alexander, 33, joined OnlyFans in 2019, before the site’s profile surged as the Covid-19 pandemic pushed many previously IRL activities online. As such, he’s a pioneer of the safe-for-work OnlyFans scene and has amassed more than 67,000 likes on his page. (OnlyFans only displays a user’s like count publicly; the follower count, which is usually higher, is hidden.)
Most of those people are there for his music, but, like Hastings, he’s had some fans cross the line into asking for sexual content. “There are people who try to get me to offer other types of content and stuff like that,” he says.
Alexander isn’t opposed to showing the occasional rippling bicep or taut pectoral but declines to go the full monty. “I do more of the R&B look, where it’s still tasteful but it’s not completely nude,” he explains.
For the uninitiated, the OnlyFans homepage has a simple design, with lots of white space, sans-serif text in black and blue, and a few embedded videos. These videos feature young men or women (usually women) working on DIY projects or making recipes—they just tend to wear less clothing or show more cleavage than you might expect on a site’s front door.
Venture beyond the homepage, however, and you can find some seriously X-rated content. OnlyFans declines to break out how the $5.3 billion it funneled to creators last year was split between sexual and nonsexual content. “We don’t categorize our creators into SFW/NSFW. OnlyFans is all over 18 so we don’t need to,” says an external spokesperson speaking for the company.
But I want my own tiny share of those billions—and I’m prepared to risk public ridicule to get them. So, one Wednesday in late September, having packed the kids safely off to school, I set up an account of my very own.
After being verified on the platform, I decide my debut will be a one-minute video simply introducing myself. I immediately bump up against OnlyFans’ discoverability problem.
Whether you’re on OnlyFans for numismatics or nudes, finding the content you want is hard. The site’s search functionality is severely limited, allowing you to search the posts of only people you already follow. There’s also no algorithmically driven feed to surface posts you might like. Follow 10 comedians on Instagram and the app will be sure to push you more jokes. Follow 10 comedians on OnlyFans and you’ll still have no idea how to find an 11th.
OnlyFans tells me the lack of proper search functionality is a deliberate safety feature, “so fans don’t stumble across content they don’t want to see,” says the spokesperson. Several third-party sites, with names like OnlyFinder and NosyFan, have stepped in to fill the vacuum—for those who very much do want to see.
If people are going to find my OnlyFans page, I have to do what everyone else does: Promote it elsewhere. So I take a deep breath and write posts for my few thousand followers on X and LinkedIn.
On usually sober LinkedIn, the vibe is riotous. Reactions include “I shudder to think what you’re posting there,” “let me know when the NSFW one launches pls,” and “you’ve got to give the people what they want, Andrew.” My post on X mainly gets responses from bot accounts called things like United Babes, suggesting we follow each other’s OnlyFans pages. The topic even comes up at my regular five-a-side football kickabout.
The result of all this public attention? One measly follower on OnlyFans. To win over some more, I embrace the imperfect and upload a home-recorded video of me indulging in one of my favorite pastimes: reading a classic novel (Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome). I also post a wind-blown update from the reservoir where I sometimes go sailing.
Top content like this sees my follower count surge to a mighty five. Time to slam down the paywall and rake in some cold, hard cash. Time for my first locked post on OnlyFans.
Asking subscribers to pay for nontitillating content poses an awkward question: What can I possibly offer that’s worth any money? As a 20-year media veteran, I decide to post some tips for how PR professionals can best get their message across to journalists. Gold, surely?
Unfortunately, despite promoting the video across my X and LinkedIn accounts once again, I find no one willing to pay the $5 to view it.
I’m starting to get tired with the platform’s interface, which makes casual browsing hard. A major difference between OnlyFans and other social platforms is that creators’ posts—even those that are thoroughly safe for work—are all locked unless you register and subscribe to that page. While you can browse most Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok posts without logging in or following an account, OnlyFans exists within its own walled garden.
Despite these limitations, OnlyFans’ creator accounts increased by 29 percent last year to 4.1 million, according to its parent company’s latest financial filing. Fan accounts grew by 28 percent to 305 million. (The company doesn’t say how many of these accounts are active.) More than 300 million users and I can’t find even one willing to pay for my content. They can’t all be there for porn, can they?
For creators, a major advantage of OnlyFans over Instagram or TikTok is the way direct payments from fans are baked in from the start. Many rival apps expect creators to post content for free, with the only reward coming from growing online clout as their follower counts climb. OnlyFans provides a smaller pool of users, but one with verified payment details who are just a click away from emptying their wallets.
Another draw for creators on OnlyFans is the flexibility it gives over how they charge. Want to paywall your entire profile? Pick a price between $4.99 and $50 a month. Want to add fees to unlock specific posts? Slap on your own price tag, up to $100. Want to make fans pay to message you? All these options and more are easy to set up.
“All your subscribers are invested in you. They’re interested in you, your lifestyle,” says Liam O’Neill, a 33-year-old professional golfer who has amassed 2,300 likes on his OnlyFans profile after some 18 months on the site. He also has a sponsorship deal with OnlyFans to display the company’s logo on his golf bag at tournaments. “It’s much more personable. I can easily reply to people on OnlyFans DM, whereas on Instagram it can be a bit more diluted.”
O’Neill keeps his main feed free, but charges followers for suggestions on how to improve their golf swing via DMs. Alexander, the musician, provides a menu of paid options on his profile, like “$35 for me to sing you a personalized Happy Birthday message.” He experimented with paywalling his content behind a $4.99 monthly subscription, but finds fans prefer more piecemeal payments.
OnlyFans takes a 20 percent cut from all these payments, accumulating a handy $1.3 billion in revenue last year. Only 41 percent of that was from recurring subscriptions, lending weight to Alexander’s personal experience. In its accounts, the company reports having just 42 staff members, leading to a jaw-dropping $31 million in revenue per employee.
OnlyFans’ commission is low compared with some rivals. YouTube, for example, takes a 45 percent cut of advertising revenue generated from its longer videos, and only for creators with a sufficiently large following. The cut is even higher for posts on YouTube’s Shorts platform.
Back-of-the-envelope calculations indicate that the average OnlyFans creator account netted some $1,300 last year, although research suggests the vast majority of income flows to the top 10 percent of accounts, leaving very little for those at the bottom of the pack. Many (sexual) accounts insist they make millions of dollars a year, often posting screenshots on social media to back up their claims.
By contrast, most of the SFW OnlyFans creators I talked to for this article were coy about their income from the site. Nate Craig, a 47-year-old comedian based in Los Angeles, agreed to share his numbers, but they’re hardly inspiring: He’s made less than $100 from fans in the year or two he’s been on the platform.
Craig isn’t really on OnlyFans for the occasional $5 tip, however. Like many SFW performers, the platform paid him to join. A producer working for OnlyFans approached him with a tempting offer: OnlyFans would film one of his sets and pay him a “good” sum for his trouble (Craig declined to specify how much) on the condition that the stand-up would share the OnlyFans-watermarked video widely across his other social media—and agree to post regularly on his OnlyFans page.
“They were pretty straightforward about it. They were like, ‘We want to open up our site to other types of content creators,’” the comedian tells me on a video call, while bouncing his infant son on his knee. “They didn’t say this, but it was clear they wanted to expand their brand.”
Despite OnlyFans’ best efforts to diversify into more SFW terrain, it still has one key problem: Not many people who want that kind of content want to see it on OnlyFans.
After I promote my paywalled OnlyFans post on LinkedIn, one PR professional, the target market for my advice, replies, “I’m super curious about the contents of the video but also do not want to give OF my personal data and sign up for an account.” Another respondent says he would be “worried about people seeing OnlyFans on my card statement,” while a third, a former newsroom colleague, seems disgusted with the whole enterprise.
“I want to read your thoughts on PR and journalism, but joining OnlyFans is a strict no-no,” he gripes. “I think your potential subscribers will be afraid they will be seen as consumers of the other thing that this platform offers and who only use you as a human shield.”
Ouch.
So what have I gained from my OnlyFans adventure? After a couple of weeks, I’m sad to report I have earned a grand total of zero dollars. I didn’t even get anyone sliding into my DMs to propose something inappropriate. But I did get something fun to talk about the next time I bump into the neighbors.
Update: 10/23/2024 10:50 AM EDT: Statements attributed to a spokesperson speaking on behalf of OnlyFans have been clarified.
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