Selling content on fan subscription platforms

The research was done by AI agents that open web pages. Some sites refuse them; where that happened we say so. The small numbers point to the source list at the end. Where a figure is our own sum or guess, it is marked “our estimate” and the basis is given.

The claim

Our collection for this scheme holds only 5 tweets¹. All five invite other creators to try Fanvue through the poster. Three mention the poster’s link or referral link; the other two are cut off in our copy before the sentence ends¹. None states an income, a price or a fee¹. So this page rests mostly on how the method is promoted in general, and on the platforms’ own pages. The tweets are examples of the pitch. The page judges the scheme, not the people who tweeted.

We did not look at what these accounts publish and say nothing about it; the tweets do not mention adult content. The sections below about adult content concern the platforms in general. View counts are as collected. Dates are worked out from each tweet’s ID number. We leave out the short links at the end of each tweet.

“You’re already putting the effort into creating — make sure your platform gives you different ways to monetise it. @Fanvue makes that much easier. Creators, if you’re curious about trying it yourself, get in touch and I’ll help you get started with my link ♥️♥️”

@MiaHawthorne00, 30 September 2026, 12,682 views¹

“Being a creator is so much easier when your platform actually works with you 🔥 @fanvue gives creators smart tools, different ways to monetise content and real support when you need it. Creators, if you want to see what Fanvue could do for you, message me and I’ll send you my” (cut off in our copy)

@FlitterDiana, 5 October 2026, 4,899 views¹

“One thing I’ve learnt as a creator is that the platform you choose matters. I’ve been loving Fanvue for the creator tools, flexibility and all the different ways you can earn from your content. If you’re a creator looking for something different, DM me and I’ll help you get” (cut off in our copy)

@sophietulipss, 6 October 2026, 885 views¹

“Being a creator is much easier when your platform works with you. @fanvue gives creators smart tools, different ways to monetise content and real support when needed. Creators, if you want to see what Fanvue could do for you, message me or check my link:”

@evie_scarlett7, 6 October 2026, 420 views¹

Three of the five tweets open with nearly the same sentence. All five ask the reader to get in touch; one also posts its link¹. That link led, when we followed it, to a Fanvue sign-up address carrying a referral code and a campaign label, “amb”⁵⁸. We do not know what the label stands for, and found no Fanvue page that describes an ambassador programme. None of the stored texts shows a tag such as #ad¹. We did not view the tweets’ images, videos or threads, and two texts are cut off, so a disclosure or an income figure may be there unseen.

What the scheme is

A fan subscription platform is a website where fans pay a monthly fee to see one creator’s posts. Fans can also tip, and can pay for single items sent in private messages. The two platforms covered here are OnlyFans and Fanvue. Fanvue’s homepage calls itself “a home for all creators, you could be an influencer, athlete, artist and so much more”¹⁹. Both platforms also allow adult content, and Fanvue’s age-check page says the checks exist because laws require platforms to verify that users of “this type of content” are adults¹⁸. Fanvue also allows creators that are AI-generated characters, under conditions described below¹⁶.

The pitch has two parts: open a creator account and earn from fans, and do it through the poster. Three of the tweets mention the poster’s link¹. A referral link is a sign-up address that tells the platform who sent the new creator. Fanvue pays the sender a share of what the new creator earns⁴.

Joining costs nothing. Fanvue asks for an identity check and says sign-up takes about 15 minutes¹⁵. The platform takes its fee from each fan payment.

The arithmetic

The tweets give no number to check, so we built the sum from the platforms’ own pages.

Step 1: the fee

Fanvue’s policy says: “the standard Creator Earning Rate is 80% of gross revenue from Paid-for Services, with the remaining 20% retained by Fanvue as Platform Fees”². OnlyFans’ terms say: “Our Fee is calculated as 20% of the total Fan Payment”²⁷. The fee is the same on both. To take home $1,000 before tax, fans must spend $1,250 (our sum: 1,000 / 0.8).

A reader may see “85%” on some Fanvue pages, and the sources disagree. The homepage says “you take home 85% of your earnings for your first month, 80% thereafter”¹⁹. The help centre says the 85% rate for creators who joined in 2022 “has come to an end”⁶. The policy allows a temporary promotional rate that Fanvue can withdraw². We use 80%.

Step 2: the price

Fanvue lets a creator set a subscription from $3.99 to $100 a month, and says “$9.99-$15 performing best across the platform on average”⁷. A second Fanvue article says most successful creators price between $5 and $30¹².

Step 3: the volume, from subscriptions alone

Paying subscribers needed in a given month, after the 20% fee and before tax (our sums: target / (price x 0.8), rounded up):

Step 4: subscribers leave

Fanvue publishes how long subscriptions last: “roughly 4 in 10 subscriptions last beyond the first 30-day cycle (i.e., the fan renews at least once), and about 1 in 4 last 90 days or longer”⁷. So about six in ten new subscribers pay once and go.

How a fan arrives changes this. Of fans who join on a time-limited discount, “about 7 in 10 leave within the first month, and only 1 in 5 stay past 90 days”⁸. Fans who join on a free trial spend about five times less over their lifetime than paying subscribers⁸.

So a creator must keep replacing a large part of the list. Fanvue does not publish the average length of a subscription. As an illustration (our estimate): if subscribers stay two to three months on average, holding 126 of them means finding about 40 to 60 new ones every month (126 / 3 and 126 / 2), and holding 1,252 means about 400 to 600.

Step 5: most of the money is not the subscription

Fanvue’s own data changes the picture. For creators in their first two months, “the subscription itself accounts for only around ~10% of what they earn. The largest share, around ~60%, comes from paid messages in DMs”⁷. A DM is a direct (private) message. A second Fanvue page says: “Priced messages alone make up over half of new-creator earnings, more once you count tips.”⁹ Fanvue suggests $10 to $15 as a floor for the cheapest paid item sent this way¹¹.

The same holds for an established creator on OnlyFans. Of the $143,000 one creator made in 2021, which Business Insider checked against her documents, $96,000 came from paid messages and personalised content, $27,000 from tips and $21,700 from subscriptions³⁵. Subscriptions were about 15% (our sum).

This cuts both ways. A creator who sells paid messages needs fewer subscribers than the table shows, but the income is then made in one-to-one conversation, which takes hours every day. Two successful cases give a rough idea of income per fan. An unnamed operator told Fortune of $2,500 to $4,000 a month from about 150 paying subscribers⁴⁰: about $17 to $27 per subscriber per month (our sum; the article does not say whether this is before or after the fee). A second creator whose documents Business Insider checked took home $359,063 in 2021, after the fee, with about 2,400 subscribers³⁴: about $12 per subscriber per month in take-home, or about $16 in fan spending (our estimate: 359,063 / 0.8 / 2,400 / 12; the subscriber count is from 2022).

Step 6: where the fans come from

The platform supplies little audience that we can measure. Discover is the page inside Fanvue where fans browse creators. Fanvue says: “The Discover section is randomised by default, so all eligible creators get a chance to be seen. Within that, new, rapidly growing, and high-performing accounts appear nearer the top. Intro videos are always guaranteed a placement in Discover.”¹⁰ So a new account gets some placement, but Fanvue publishes no figure for how many fans this brings. It also says: “Getting your first fans can be tough.”¹⁰ Its guide starts from “turning your existing social following (or a brand-new one) into traffic that reaches your Fanvue”⁹. Its pages differ on how much to post before promoting: at least 3, 10 or 20 pieces, and the last advises posting daily after that¹⁰¹⁵¹².

How many followers become paying fans? Neither platform publishes this. A tool seller’s benchmark page that an earlier pass of this research relied on now returns “page not found”⁴⁴, so we give no rate. One checked case has both numbers: in early 2022 the creator who made $143,000 had about 3,000 subscribers and “a combined following of 40,000 on three profiles” on Instagram³⁵. That is about 7 subscribers per 100 Instagram followers (our sum). We do not know her other sources of traffic, so this is one favourable case, not a rate.

As an illustration, not a finding: if 1 follower in 100 paid, 126 subscribers would need 12,600 followers and 1,252 would need 125,200. At the rate in the checked case, they would need about 1,700 and 17,000 (our estimate).

Step 7: what Fanvue’s public referral terms pay a referrer

Fanvue’s policy says “the Referring User shall receive 5% of the Referred Creator’s Qualifying Revenue, calculated after deduction of Platform Fees”⁴. The payment runs for 12 months for creators who registered on or after 9 April 2026, and is capped at $50,000 per referred creator⁴. Fanvue pays it from its own fee, “not deducted from the referred Creator”³. It may agree a different rate with an individual referrer in writing⁴. We do not know what terms, if any, the accounts quoted above have.

So a referral link costs the new creator nothing. It also tells the reader nothing about earnings.

The sums (our estimate): a recruit whose fans spend $1,000 a month keeps $800, and the referrer gets $40 a month, or $480 over the 12 months. Fanvue’s help page for referrers says: “Most referrers earn relatively little.”⁵ OnlyFans has the same kind of scheme: 5% of the referred creator’s fan payments for 12 months, “up to a maximum referral payment of US$50,000 per Referred Creator”²⁸.

What people who tried it report

The platform-wide average

The firmest number is from OnlyFans’ audited accounts, filed in the United Kingdom on 20 September 2026. “During the reporting period the Company paid out $6.2bn (2024: $5.7bn) to Creators”³⁰. The period is the year to 30 November 2025. The accounts list 5,063,000 creator accounts and 437,133,000 fan accounts, and $7.8bn of fan payments³⁰.

Our sum: $6.2bn divided by 5,063,000 accounts is about $1,225 per creator account for the year, or about $102 a month. The year before, the same sum gives about $1,230: creator accounts grew 9% and the payout per account did not grow³⁰.

Two cautions. The accounts say totals “refer to the accounts created on OnlyFans that have not been deleted by the user or deactivated by the platform to date”³⁰. So dormant accounts are counted, and active creators average more by an unknown amount. A news site reports 2.5 million active creators and says the figure comes from regulatory filings³³. We ran text recognition over all 45 scanned pages of the filed accounts and found no count of active creators³⁰. So the figure is second-hand and its origin is unconfirmed. If it were right, the payout would be about $207 a month per active creator (an estimate on an unverified figure: $6.2bn / 2.5 million / 12). Second, this is a mean (the total divided by the number of accounts). A few very large earners pull it up, so the typical account gets less.

How the money is spread

The only spread of earnings we found with a described method is from 2020. A writer scraped “around one thousand” OnlyFans accounts and estimated income from subscription prices and fan counts³¹. He found: “The median account makes $180 a month. The top 1% of accounts make 33% of all the money. The top 10% of accounts make 73% of all the money.”³¹ The median is the middle account: half make more, half less. After the fee the median account took home about $136 to $145 (the post gives both; 80% of $180 is $144), and the most common income was $0³¹.

Its limits are real. It is six years old. The sample is small and the post does not say it is random³¹. Where fan counts were hidden, the author estimated them from likes per post, which he calls “likely an underestimate”, and he set accounts with several prices to the lowest, $4.99³¹. It counts subscriptions only and misses tips³¹.

OnlyFans’ own figures show roughly how much that leaves out. Its 2021 investor pitch, as reported by Axios, said: “Over 50% of OnlyFans revenue in March came from paid subscriptions, while more than 30% came via chats.”³² Reuters reported that tips and custom content “accounted for slightly more revenue than subscriptions in 2022”⁴⁶. So subscriptions were about half of the total, and the real median in 2020 was probably nearer double the $180 than equal to it (our estimate).

Many 2026 web pages repeat “median $180” and “top 1% earn 33%”. Those we traced go back to this one post. We found no newer measured spread for either platform.

The same pitch, compiled at the end of March 2021, said: “More than 300 creators earn at least $1 million annually. Around 16,000 creators earn at least $50,000 annually.”³² OnlyFans had over 1.5 million creators according to a 2022 research paper⁵², and told Business Insider in November 2021 that it had over 2 million³⁵. On those counts, roughly one creator in 90 to 125 earned $50,000 or more (our estimate; the count for March 2021 itself was not found).

Fanvue

Fanvue publishes totals and no spread. Its homepage says “Powering over $500m in creator payouts” and “Join 200,000+ creators”¹⁹. Taken at face value that is about $2,500 per creator over the platform’s whole life, or about $1,540 using the 325,000+ creators on Fanvue’s about page (our sums)¹⁹²². Other counts differ again: 150,000+ on one landing page²², and 250,000 in both the January 2026 and the July 2026 press releases²⁴²⁵. The counts are not a reliable series. The July release says “72% of the platform’s earning creators now use its AI tools”²⁴. So Fanvue does count earning creators separately, and does not publish how many there are.

The July 2026 release gives “an annualised revenue run rate of more than $200 million”²⁴. A run rate is one recent month multiplied by twelve. The release does not say outright whether this is everything fans paid or only Fanvue’s 20% share. The sources lean towards Fanvue’s share, which gives the higher figure for creators:

• The release calls it revenue²⁴.
• Sacra, a research firm, says Fanvue “generates revenue by taking a 20% cut of all transactions”, and estimates that revenue at $40 million for 2024 and “over $10 million per month by the end of 2025”²⁶.
• If those figures were all fan spending, fans would have spent roughly $230 million so far (our rough sum from Sacra’s yearly figures and the two announced run rates), and 80% of that is under $200 million. That cannot reach the “over $500m in creator payouts” on the homepage¹⁹. This is our reasoning from rough sums, not a statement by Fanvue.

On the share reading, the mean listed creator receives about $205 to $267 a month (our estimate: $200m / 0.2 x 0.8 / 12, divided by 325,000 and by 250,000 creators). That is about double the OnlyFans figure. On the lower reading, where $200 million is all fan spending, it is about $41 to $53 a month (our estimate). Either way this is a mean across listed accounts. The typical creator is below it, and we do not know how many listed creators earn anything.

Every “typical earnings” figure we found for Fanvue comes from a company that sells to its creators, with no method shown. A seller of chat software puts the middle active creator “somewhere in the $150 to $300 per month range”⁴¹. A seller of software for making images of an invented model says “A solo operator can realistically reach $0–$500 per month within the first 90 days”⁴². A management agency says about 70% of active OnlyFans creators earn under $200 a month, and calls its figures “well-supported estimates, not audited financial disclosures”⁴³. These are sellers’ estimates, not data. They are worth noting only because even sellers start low.

Other reports

On Trustpilot, Fanvue scores 4.5 from 2,214 reviews, and the ones we saw do not report earnings⁵¹. Trustpilot’s own summary says reviewers praise the support and ease of use, and that some negative ones mention unanswered emails, unresponsive support over account suspensions, and verification or login problems⁵¹. A few individual reviews complain of withheld payouts, and one says stuck payouts were resolved quickly⁵¹. Trustpilot says it does not verify specific claims⁵¹. On the company’s side, Fanvue’s terms let a creator dispute a forfeiture, suspension or termination through its Complaints Policy within six months³.

Interview studies of creators report no income figures. A 2026 study in the British Journal of Sociology, based on 45 interviews, describes the work as continuous and insecure, and a 2026 South African study of 17 creators reports copied content and extortion threats as routine difficulties⁵². We read only the summaries. Reddit refused our tools, so we read no first-hand reports there.

What the rules allow now

What is allowed. An adult who passes an identity check can sell their own content on either platform, keep 80%, and recruit other creators by referral link²⁴²⁷²⁸.

AI characters. Fanvue allows them with conditions: “you must disclose that it is not real and was generated using AI”¹⁶. The account owner must pass an identity check, and the character must not look like another real person or look under 18¹⁶. OnlyFans’ rules ban explicit images of another person without consent, “including an artificially generated image”²⁹. Sacra says another platform, Fansly, banned photorealistic AI content in June 2025²⁶. So the AI version of this scheme leans heavily on one platform’s policy.

What is not allowed. Taking payments or chats off the platform is banned on Fanvue: “Breach of this clause is grounds for immediate account suspension, payout withholding, and possible permanent removal from the Platform.”³ A September 2026 update added that the platform “may not be used to request, arrange, offer, advertise or promote in-person meetings”²³. Referring yourself is banned⁴.

Getting paid. Fanvue’s policy says: “The standard Pending Period is seven (7) days, but this may be extended up to twenty-eight (28) days”². The minimum withdrawal is $20¹³.

Chargebacks. A chargeback is when a fan’s bank reverses a payment. The amount is taken back from the creator³. Fanvue’s terms add: “If your account exceeds a 1.5% dispute rate (including chargebacks and refunds) over a 30-day period, we may apply a $50 USD (FIFTY US DOLLARS) administrative fee per dispute thereafter.”³ Its help page adds that payouts may be restricted while the rate stays high¹⁴.

Losing a balance. If Fanvue finds a breach it may “treat any part of your Creator Earnings as forfeited”³. OnlyFans’ terms allow it to “suspend or delete your account with 30 days’ Notice, at any time, for any reason”²⁷. We found no figures for how often either platform does these things.

Tax. The 80% is income before tax. “Fanvue does NOT withhold any taxes on behalf of the creator”¹⁷. In the UK, the tax office says platform operators “will report your details and your income from selling goods or services on their platform to HMRC”⁵⁴.

Disclosure when promoting a link. Fanvue’s terms say: “You are responsible for complying with marketing laws and disclosure rules applicable in your region.”³ Rules differ by country, and we do not know where any poster lives. As one example, the United States regulator’s guidance for US endorsers says: “The use of ‘#ambassador’ or ‘partner’ is ambiguous and confusing.”⁵³

Country law. This depends on where the creator lives. A European legal summary of Swedish law says: “As of 1 July 2025, it is illegal to pay someone to perform sexual acts remotely, for example via video, livestream or on-demand clips.”⁵⁵ That rule is aimed at the buyer and at third parties who profit, and we read the summary, not the law itself. A news agency report says Turkish police arrested 16 adult content creators linked to OnlyFans in February 2026 “on charges of money laundering”, according to prosecutors; they were 16 of 25 people named in a warrant, and OnlyFans is banned there⁵⁵. Those are arrests and charges, not convictions.

Banks. In August 2021 OnlyFans announced a ban on explicit content, then dropped it days later, saying: “We have secured assurances necessary to support our diverse creator community”⁵⁶. A creator’s income rests partly on decisions made by banks and card companies.

Regulators and courts. The UK regulator Ofcom said in March 2025 that it had “fined the provider of OnlyFans, Fenix International Limited, £1.05 million for failing to accurately respond to formal requests for information about its age assurance measures”⁵⁷. That concerns only the company named, and is not about creator earnings. A US class action (a lawsuit brought on behalf of a group) filed in 2024 alleges that management agencies use paid staff to message fans in the creator’s name⁴⁷. Bloomberg Law reported in May 2026 that OnlyFans’ operator was dismissed from the case while one claim continues against the agencies⁴⁷. The case is pending and the allegations are unproven; it concerns only the companies named in it. We found no regulator action or lawsuit about Fanvue, and none about recruiting creators by referral. That rests on few searches.

Who makes money from it

The platform, on every sale. It keeps 20% whether a creator earns $50 or $50,000²²⁷. OnlyFans’ accounts for the year to November 2025 show revenue of $1,553,309,000 and profit before tax of $714,855,000³⁰.

The referrer, if the recruit earns. Fanvue’s partner page invites “creators, agencies, coaches, educators and community owners” to recruit, and leads with: “Your first referral could be worth $62,910. That’s 5% of one top AI creator’s earnings, over 12 months.”²⁰ The page marks its figures as illustrative²⁰. Fanvue has also run short campaigns paying $500 for each referred creator who earned $500 in their first 30 days; those we read ended by March 2026²¹. Against the partner page’s example stands the same company’s help page: “Most referrers earn relatively little.”⁵ On the OnlyFans average, one average recruit would be worth about $61 to a referrer over a year under Fanvue’s rule (5% of the $1,225 take-home), or about $77 under OnlyFans’ rule (5% of fan payments, which are $1,225 / 0.8). Both are our estimate.

OnlyFans’ referral terms go further. Referrers there agree: “you will not make any statements which suggest that a Creator will make a particular sum of money (or any money) on OnlyFans.”²⁸

Agencies. Some creators hand their account to a management agency. Reuters reported in 2024: “Some agencies charge a flat fee, but most work on commission, taking 20% to 80% of a model’s total earnings.”⁴⁶ The US complaint mentioned above alleges fees of roughly 20% to 30% at the agencies it names, which is an allegation in a pending case⁴⁷. A 2021 BuzzFeed News article reported contracts at one agency group that renewed automatically for three years or more; the agency’s founders said the claims in a related lawsuit “are broadly stated and not supported by any evidence”⁴⁸. A creator who uses an agency may keep about half of what fans spend (our estimate: 80% less a 30% agency share leaves 56%).

Software sellers. Tools for chatting with fans and keeping notes on each one charge per creator account. Infloww lists “Starting at just $40” per profile per month⁵⁰. Supercreator lists $15 per account per month for one plan and $99 per account per month “+5% of AI Net Sales” for another⁵⁰.

Course sellers. A directory of 43 courses, run by a company that sells to agencies, says most teach how to start a management agency, with published prices from €47 to €997, and that “Only 47% of the pages we could read state a price without booking a call”⁴⁹. That is 9 of the 19 pages it could read; the median published price is €197⁴⁹. One such community we opened charges $99 a month and states an aim of $10,000 a month, with no proof on the page; it showed one member when we looked, so it is not evidence of a market⁴⁹. Creators sell courses too. Business Insider reported in 2022 that the creator with the checked $143,000 was preparing a course for would-be creators at $495 to $920, with 2,600 people on a waiting list who had not yet paid³⁵.

The upside

Fans do pay, and some creators earn a great deal. These are the best documented cases we found. All the checked ones are on OnlyFans, from 2020 to 2023.

The first case is the strongest for an ordinary person. She recalls making about $1,000 in March 2020, her third month; that is her own statement, not among the checked figures³⁴. Business Insider reports that by December 2020 she was making enough to leave her job³⁴. The article does not say where her fans came from.

Where the top sits. OnlyFans shows creators their rank. In the two checked cases, $143,000 in 2021 was “the top 0.46%” of creators³⁵ and about $360,000 to $410,000 was the top 0.2%³⁴. So a six-figure income is real and needed only a few thousand fans. In 2021 it meant out-earning more than 199 of every 200 creator accounts on the platform’s own ranking. Two cautions. We do not know whether the rank counts dormant accounts; if it does, the competition among people actually working at it is less steep than it sounds. And OnlyFans had over 2 million creators then³⁵ and lists 5.06 million accounts now³⁰, so the 2026 rank for the same income is different, and it is not published.

OnlyFans announced in August 2026 that 5,076 creators have earned at least $1 million in total since 2016, according to Tubefilter³³. Against 5.06 million accounts that is about one in a thousand, over ten years (our sum).

If the 2020 shares still held in 2025, the top 1% of OnlyFans accounts would average about $40,000 a year, the top 10% about $8,900 a year, and the other 90% about $370 a year. That is our estimate, applying a small 2020 sample that was not random³¹ to 2025 totals³⁰.

Fanvue. It is growing fast by its own account: its announced run rate went from over $100 million in January 2026 to over $200 million in July²⁴²⁵. Its homepage says: “There are creators on the platform making hundreds of thousands each month”¹⁹. That is the company’s claim, with no names or proof on the page. Sacra estimates that top AI creators there make “$20,000+ monthly”²⁶. We found no income for any individual Fanvue creator that a newsroom or anyone else had checked.

A realistic good result (our estimate). No dataset follows newcomers who start in 2026, so this is a judgement from the averages and the retention figures above. With no existing following: tens to a few hundred dollars a month in the first six months, in line with the platform averages and with sellers’ own timetables³⁰⁴². With a following in the tens of thousands on a network that allows the link, and daily work: low thousands of dollars a month within 6 to 12 months is plausible. The one checked case with both numbers had 40,000 Instagram followers and about 3,000 subscribers two years in³⁵. Both checked six-figure cases began in early 2020, at the start of the pandemic, and reached six figures in 2021³⁴³⁵.

What it takes to compete

An audience, usually brought from elsewhere. Both platforms’ guidance points this way, but no dataset measures how much audience size explains earnings. Fanvue’s feed gives new accounts some placement, and its own pages still tell creators to bring traffic from outside⁹¹⁰. It lists X, Reddit, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube for promotion, and says only X and Reddit allow adult content¹⁰. The documented cases cut both ways. The creator with the checked $143,000 had 40,000 Instagram followers³⁵. And a YouTuber with nearly seven million followers reported more than $100,000 in under a year on a page she describes as non-nude³⁸, so a very large audience does not convert by itself.

Daily selling in private messages. Fanvue says “Most of what new creators earn comes from conversations, not posts.”⁹ The best-documented ordinary case sends a paid item to many fans at once twice a day at fixed times, posts every two hours, keeps a library of 150 videos and makes custom videos from $150³⁴.

Time, or a team. In the $5.4m case, Business Insider reports that the creator and her partner “normally work 80-hour weeks”³⁶. Another creator on the same list said: “For about six months, I just had no idea what I was doing”, and found workable prices only after talking to other creators³⁶. At the top, a solo newcomer competes with accounts run by hired chat staff; a Wired reporter who applied for such jobs was offered “$5 per hour plus a 0.5 percent sales commission”⁴⁵. Fanvue says in a press release that creators who use its AI tools earn three to six times more; it shows no data, and larger creators may simply be the ones who adopt tools²⁴.

Money. Little to start. Joining is free and software starts at $15 to $40 a month¹⁵⁵⁰. Producing at the level of the checked cases costs more: one sets aside a few days every two months to shoot in hotels, the other rents a location once a month³⁴³⁵. This is also why the field is crowded: a Fanvue release said “more than 20,000 new creators joined the platform last month”²⁵.

Accepting the lasting costs. Content published under one’s own face is hard to withdraw, and interview studies report stigma, copied content and extortion threats as routine⁵².

How to tell early which side you are on.

• Before starting: do you already have followers who engage (who regularly like or reply), on a network that allows the link? If you have none, the first job is building that audience, which is a separate task measured in months.
• In the first month: do paying fans arrive from your own posts, without a discount or free trial? Fanvue’s figures say trial and discount fans are worth far less⁸.
• After 30 days: do about 4 in 10 of your subscribers renew? That is Fanvue’s platform-wide figure⁷. Well below it means fans are not finding what they paid for.
• By the third month: sellers’ own timetables put a new solo operator at $0 to $500 a month⁴². One creator recalls about $1,000 in her third month, but that is her own statement about March 2020, the first lockdown month³⁴. Treat it as an upper marker.
• Throughout: are you willing to spend hours a day in paid conversation? That, not posting, is where Fanvue says the money is⁷.

As for the referral link: it is free to use and takes nothing from your share³. A referral link is a reason to recommend the platform; it is not evidence about earnings.

What we did not verify

• The tweets themselves. We read the stored text only. Images, videos, threads and profiles were not viewed, so we cannot say whether any carries an income figure or an ad label, or what else the accounts link to. Whether any poster has a referral arrangement, and on what terms, is unknown. We did not fetch the full text of the two tweets that are cut off.
• Whether Fanvue’s “run rate” means all fan spending or Fanvue’s own share. The sources lean towards its share, but none settles it, and our per-creator range depends on it.
• Any median, spread or share-earning-anything for Fanvue creators. Fanvue publishes none, and we did not open the filed accounts of its owner.
• How many OnlyFans creator accounts are active. The filed accounts give no such count in any of their 45 pages, which we read as scanned images through text recognition (which can miss words); the 2.5 million reported second-hand is unconfirmed.
• A current spread of OnlyFans earnings. The only one is from 2020.
• How many followers become paying fans. We have one favourable case and no rate; the one seller’s page we had no longer exists.
• The star breakdown of Fanvue’s Trustpilot reviews, which our route to the page did not show, and how the platform’s rank percentages treat dormant accounts.
• Hours worked. We found only individual press cases.
• Fanvue’s current introductory rate, the dates of some of its policy pages, and whether any referral bonus campaign is running now.
• OnlyFans’ August 2026 announcement about million-dollar earners, which we read second-hand.
• Agency fees on agencies’ own pages, most course prices, refund terms, and Fansly’s own page on AI content.
• The Swedish law itself, the US tax-form threshold, and X’s own rules on adult content and paid promotion (X’s help pages refused our tools).
• Routes. Fanvue’s legal and help pages were read directly or through the r.jina.ai reader. OnlyFans’ pages, Axios, Wired, Trustpilot, the US regulator’s guidance, the Reuters copy and the US prosecutor’s release worked only through that reader. The Ofcom page was read in an Internet Archive copy. Fanvue’s press releases were read in syndicated copies, one in Italian. Business Insider’s pages loaded directly with a browser-style request. Reddit, Reuters’ own site and several newspapers refused.

Sources

1. Does It Pay collection of 5 tweets on this scheme, collected 2026-10-06. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (stored text only).
2. Fanvue, Creator Earnings and Payouts policy. https://legal.fanvue.com/creator-earnings-payouts . One reading shows “updated 22 April 2026”, another no date. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
3. Fanvue, Creator Terms. https://legal.fanvue.com/creator-terms . Updated 2026-09-19. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
4. Fanvue, Creator Referral and Affiliate policy. https://legal.fanvue.com/creator-referral-affiliate . Updated 2026-09-19 per Fanvue’s change log. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
5. Fanvue Help, “Referrals: everything you need to know”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9526966-referrals-everything-you-need-to-know . Marked “Updated this week”. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
6. Fanvue Help, “Earning rate changes for creators on Fanvue”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7860515-earning-rate-changes-for-creators-on-fanvue . Marked “Updated over 2 weeks ago”. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
7. Fanvue Help, “Subscription pricing and retention guide”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16233102-subscription-pricing-retention-guide . 2026-08-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
8. Fanvue Help, “Running profitable promotions”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16237907-running-profitable-promotions . 2026-08-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
9. Fanvue Help, “Getting fans to your Fanvue: socials and link in bio” and “Your first week with a new fan”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16238089-getting-fans-to-your-fanvue-socials-link-in-bio ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16238033-your-first-week-with-a-new-fan . 2026-08-07. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
10. Fanvue Help, “How discoverability works”, “Top 6 ways to get your first fan on Fanvue” and “Promoting your Fanvue page”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7860754-how-discoverability-works ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7860525-top-6-ways-to-get-your-first-fan-on-fanvue ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9526985-promoting-your-fanvue-page . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
11. Fanvue Help, “PPV media: a creator’s strategy guide”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16237634-ppv-media-a-creator-s-strategy-guide . 2026-08-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
12. Fanvue Help, “3 steps to make your first 10k on Fanvue”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9527004-3-steps-to-make-your-first-10k-on-fanvue . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
13. Fanvue Help, payout pages. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9515801-how-to-receive-a-payout-on-fanvue ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7868062-pending-vs-available-balance ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/14707946-payout-fees-on-fanvue . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
14. Fanvue Help, “Understanding chargebacks on Fanvue”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/14181018-understanding-chargebacks-on-fanvue . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
15. Fanvue Help, “Creating a Fanvue creator account” (2026-09-22) and “AI messaging” (2026-08-17). https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9506869-creating-a-fanvue-creator-account ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/16237836-ai-messaging-reply-faster-chat-smarter . Read at source on 2026-10-10.
16. Fanvue Help, AI content rules. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9538738-is-ai-content-allowed-on-fanvue ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/9539091-passing-kyc-and-creating-multiple-accounts-as-an-ai-creator ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/12089176-why-is-my-fanvue-account-restricted-and-how-can-i-regain-access (2026-03-19). Read at source on 2026-10-10.
17. Fanvue Help, tax pages. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7860548-tax-forms-on-fanvue-w-9-1099-k-w-8ben ; https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/7860767-do-fanvue-creators-pay-tax . Marked “Updated over 2 weeks ago”. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
18. Fanvue Help, “Age verification on Fanvue”. https://help.fanvue.com/en/articles/14184584-age-verification-on-fanvue . 2026-03-26. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
19. Fanvue homepage. https://www.fanvue.com/ . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
20. Fanvue partner page for referrers. https://landing.fanvue.com/pages/affiliates . Undated page, footer 2026. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
21. Fanvue blog, referral bonus and agency referral campaigns. https://landing.fanvue.com/blog/fanvue-referral-bonus-earn-500 (2025-10-27) ; https://landing.fanvue.com/blog/jaunau-500-referral-bonus (2026-01-05) ; https://landing.fanvue.com/blog/fanvue-agency-referral (2026-02-02). Read at source on 2026-10-10.
22. Fanvue landing pages. https://landing.fanvue.com/pages/about ; https://landing.fanvue.com/pages/fanvue-vs-onlyfans ; https://landing.fanvue.com/pages/earnings-blueprint . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
23. Fanvue, general Terms and Conditions (updated 2026-09-21) and change log (entry of 2026-09-25). https://legal.fanvue.com/terms-conditions ; https://legal.fanvue.com/changelog . Read at source on 2026-10-10.
24. Fanvue press release on its $200 million run rate, syndicated copy. https://www.01net.it/h1-fanvue-doubles-to-200m-run-rate-in-five-months-cementing-its-position-as-the-new-ai-infrastructure-for-the-creator-economy/ . 2026-07-10. Secondary (the Business Wire original would not load).
25. Fanvue press release of 2026-01-12 on its funding, in an Italian syndicated copy and two articles. https://www.01net.it/fanvue-la-piattaforma-di-monetizzazione-per-creatori-basata-sullia-raggiunge-ricavi-annualizzati-di-100-milioni-di-dollari-e-raccoglie-22-milioni-di-dollari-in-un-round-di-investimento-di-s/ ; https://pulse2.com/fanvue-22-million-series-a-100-million-arr/ ; https://www.forbes.com.au/news/entrepreneurs/fanvue-raises-22-million-to-fuel-the-future-of-ai-influencers/ (2026-01-19). Secondary.
26. Sacra, Fanvue company profile (undated, latest data May 2026) and research note (2026-01-21). https://sacra.com/c/fanvue/ ; https://sacra.com/research/ai-onlyfans-at-100m-year/ . Read at source on 2026-10-10. Analyst estimates.
27. OnlyFans, Terms of Service. https://onlyfans.com/terms . Last updated August 2024. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
28. OnlyFans, Referral Program Terms. https://onlyfans.com/referral-program-terms . One reading shows “last updated August 2024”, another no date. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
29. OnlyFans, Acceptable Use Policy. https://onlyfans.com/acceptable-use-policy . Last updated September 2025. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
30. Fenix International Limited (operator of OnlyFans), group accounts for the year to 30 November 2025, UK Companies House. https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/10354575/filing-history . Filed 2026-09-20. Read at source on 2026-10-10 (all 45 scanned pages, through text recognition). The per-account figures are our estimate.
31. Thomas Hollands, “The economics of OnlyFans”, XSRUS. https://xsrus.com/the-economics-of-onlyfans . 2020-04-24. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
32. Axios, report on OnlyFans’ investor pitch. https://www.axios.com/2021/08/19/onlyfans-investors-struggle . 2021-08-19. Secondary (a report on the pitch document; read through a reader service).
33. Tubefilter, report on OnlyFans’ announcement of million-dollar earners. https://www.tubefilter.com/2026/08/26/onlyfans-million-dollar-earners-keily-blair-earnings/ . 2026-08-26. Secondary.
34. Business Insider, a creator’s earnings checked against her documents. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-onlyfans-top-creator-makes-six-figure-business-2022-10 . 2022-10-24. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
35. Business Insider, a second creator’s earnings checked against her documents. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-top-onlyfans-creator-made-in-year-2022-2 . 2022-02-10, updated 2023-05-10. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
36. Business Insider, list of eight creators’ yearly earnings. https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-onlyfans-creators-make-per-year-2022-5 . 2023-01-01. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
37. US Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida, release on a tax case against one creator. https://www.justice.gov/usao-mdfl/pr/onlyfans-content-creator-charged-tax-fraud . 2025-08-14. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service. Later plea and sentence reported at https://www.news4jax.com/news/local/2026/08/20/florida-onlyfans-creator-sentenced-to-prison-for-tax-fraud-on-54m-in-earnings/ (2026-08-20, secondary).
38. Tubefilter, a YouTuber’s first-year OnlyFans earnings. https://www.tubefilter.com/2024/02/15/lizzy-capri-only-fans-earnings-first-year/ . 2024-02-15. Secondary (relays her interview with Business Insider).
39. Yahoo News Australia, “How much OnlyFans creators really make”. https://au.news.yahoo.com/how-much-only-fans-creators-really-make-001225631.html . 2022-12-23. Secondary (the creator’s own statement).
40. Fortune, AI influencers and their operators. https://fortune.com/europe/2024/02/21/ai-influencers-secretive-creators-thousands-dollars . 2024-02-21. Read at source on 2026-10-10. Figures supplied by Fanvue and an unnamed operator.
41. Fanvy blog (a seller of chat software for Fanvue creators). https://fanvy.ai/blog/how-much-fanvue-creators-make-2026 . 2026-07-29. Read at source on 2026-10-10. A seller’s estimate with no method shown.
42. Sozee (a seller of an AI model studio). https://www.sozee.ai/resources/fanvue-virtual-model-success-stories/ . 2026-07-23, updated 2026-10-02. Read at source on 2026-10-10. A seller’s estimate.
43. Aruna Talent (a management agency), “State of OnlyFans 2026”. https://arunatalent.com/blog/state-of-onlyfans-2026/ . 2026-04-14, updated 2026-10-01. Read at source on 2026-10-10. The agency’s own estimates.
44. Inro (a seller of messaging tools), follower-to-subscriber benchmarks. https://inro.social/blog/instagram-to-onlyfans-conversion-benchmarks . The address returned “page not found” (HTTP 404) on 2026-10-10. Not read; no figure on this page rests on it.
45. Wired, a reporter’s account of applying for chat jobs. https://www.wired.com/story/i-went-undercover-secret-onlyfans-chatter-wasnt-pretty/ . 2024-05-15. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
46. Reuters report on agencies, republished by Philstar (2024-07-31, read through a reader service), and a BBC report syndicated by AOL (2026-03-11). https://interaksyon.philstar.com/trends-spotlights/2024/07/31/280757/onlyfans-porn-juggernaut-fueled-by-a-deception/ ; https://www.aol.com/articles/icky-heartbreaking-2-per-hour-000445310.html . Secondary.
47. Complaint in N.Z. et al. v. Fenix International Ltd et al., US District Court, Central District of California, case 8:24-cv-01655, filed 2024-07-29, and Bloomberg Law report of 2026-05-22. https://www.hbsslaw.com/sites/default/files/case-downloads/onlyfans-chatter-scams/2024-07-29-complaint.pdf ; https://news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/onlyfans-operator-dismissed-from-chatter-scam-class-action . Complaint read at source on 2026-10-10; the Bloomberg article’s opening paragraphs only. Allegations in a pending case.
48. BuzzFeed News, report on agency contracts. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/otilliasteadman/unruly-contracts-onlyfans-creators-workers . 2021-12-16, updated 2021-12-20. Secondary (read through a summarising tool).
49. Desirely, directory of agency courses (checked 2026-09-02), and one course community’s page. https://www.desirely.co/en/ofm-courses ; https://www.skool.com/ofm-university-4542/about . Read at source on 2026-10-10. The directory’s owner sells to agencies.
50. Infloww and Supercreator pricing pages. https://infloww.com/pricing ; https://www.supercreator.app/pricing . Undated pages. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
51. Trustpilot, reviews of Fanvue. https://www.trustpilot.com/review/fanvue.com . Reviews dated up to 2026-10-07. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
52. Interview studies of creators: British Journal of Sociology, 2026-08-01, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42541742/ ; arXiv paper 2205.10425, 2022-05-20, https://arxiv.org/abs/2205.10425 ; The Conversation, 2026-09-07, https://theconversation.com/onlyfans-in-south-africa-what-creators-say-about-sex-work-personal-safety-and-the-gig-economy-289316 . Read at source on 2026-10-10 (summaries only).
53. US Federal Trade Commission, “FTC’s Endorsement Guides: What People Are Asking”. https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/ftcs-endorsement-guides-what-people-are-asking . Undated page. Read at source on 2026-10-10, through a reader service.
54. HM Revenue and Customs, “Selling goods or services on a digital platform”. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/selling-goods-or-services-on-a-digital-platform . 2024-08-01, updated 2025-09-22. Read at source on 2026-10-10.
55. European Audiovisual Observatory, IRIS 2025-7:1/10, summary of Swedish law, and an AFP report on arrests in Turkey (2026-02-14). https://merlin.obs.coe.int/article/10354 ; https://citizen.digital/article/turkey-arrests-16-onlyfans-content-creators-for-money-laundering-n377468 . Read at source on 2026-10-10.
56. LBC, OnlyFans’ statement on suspending its planned policy change. https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/cf40fd6668ae46c1b7ff1e3f945702ca-DWz2rf_2/ . 2021-08-25. Secondary.
57. Ofcom, “Ofcom fines provider of OnlyFans £1.05 million”. https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/protecting-children/ofcom-fines-provider-of-onlyfans-1.05-million . 2025-03-27. Read at source on 2026-10-10, in an Internet Archive copy.
58. The link in one collected tweet, followed to its destination: a Fanvue sign-up address with a referral code and the campaign label “amb”. The tweet is https://x.com/evie_scarlett7/status/2107482545977745536 ; we do not print the link itself, so that visits from this page are not credited to anyone. Read at source on 2026-10-10.

Corrections

If you are quoted or named on this page and think something is wrong, want your reply shown beside it, or want to be removed, write to [email protected]. We aim to reply within 14 days, and always within one month. Factual errors are corrected with a dated note here. A sentence that is seriously disputed comes down while we check it.

Change log: (empty)