Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's (open in new tab) Instagram account is almost the only window into their lives (open in new tab) now that we've stepped back as active members (open in new tab) of the royal family. Since the Sussexes launched their independent Instagram in April 2019, under the soon-to-be-changed (open in new tab) handle "@SussexRoyal" (open in new tab), they have been sharing their work they care about and their family life with baby son Archie (open in new tab) They have shared more personal insights about.

At the time of its launch, Meghan and Harry's (open in new tab) Instagram set a Guinness World Record as the fastest new account to reach 1 million followers, in just 5 hours and 45 minutes (although it was later beaten by Jennifer Aniston (open in new tab)). However, it is interesting to note that the page has continued to gain followers ever since, and some have come up with ingenious conspiracy theories to explain it.

As explained in an interesting report in the New York Times (opens in new tab), it was predicted that after the initial surge in followers, the Sussex Royal account would soon overtake the Kensington Royal (opens in new tab) account. This was shared with Prince William and Kate Middleton (opens in new tab), but is now used solely to promote the Cambridges' work and home life.

As noted by the NYT, the "eclipse" of followers was set to occur at the end of the first month the Sussexes began Instagramming, or possibly in early May of last year.

But it never happened.

Instead, Megan's (opens in new tab) and Harry's (opens in new tab) Instagram follower accounts continued to fall behind William and Kate's accounts, finally coming alongside earlier this year. Since then, the two accounts have grown at exactly the same pace, and both now have 11.3 million followers. [According to data shared with The New York Times by social media analytics tool CrowdTangle, of the posts shared on either the Kensington Royal Family account (open in new tab) or the Sussex Royal Family account, the most "liked" Nine of the 10 most liked posts were a combination of Harry and Meghan and/or Archie; the only photo that bucked the trend, according to the NYT, was a photo of Prince George and Princess Charlotte on their first day of school (the eighth most popular upload on the Kensington royal family's Instagram of all time (It was the eighth most popular upload of all time on Kensington's royal Instagram).

This indicates that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex seem to get more attention on Instagram than the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (you can read more about this in the full New York Times report (opens in a new tab)). Now, here's the question: why have the Sussexes never surpassed the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge in followers? Is there something strange going on?

At this point, it is worth noting that "representatives of both royal families have vehemently denied suggestions that their social media teams manipulated their follower counts." However, that does not stop the conspiracy theories.

One suggestion is that the Kensington royal accounts (William and Kate's) may have been given a better position on Instagram's "people to follow" list, which is known to increase followers to selected accounts.

Alternatively, there is speculation about bot involvement. Some have suggested that the opening of the Sussex Royal account may have been boosted by "bot followers" (rather than real people), which may explain why organic growth slowed unusually in the following months. Conversely, some have suggested (opens in new tab) that the Kensington royal accounts may be the ones regularly receiving bot followers in order to maintain a superior level of growth than Meghan and Harry.

Or there is another possibility. Despite statistics showing that the Cambridges' Instagram accounts have lower overall engagement than the Sussexes' accounts, no bots, no interference from Instagram, no nothing, they simply decided to follow William and Kate rather than Harry and Meghan. Maybe more people decided to follow William and Kate than Harry and Meghan.

For Matt Navarra, a British social media consultant interviewed by The New York Times for in-depth research, that is the most likely answer. 'I don't think there's anything suspicious about it,' he said. 'But I'm not going to bet my life on it.'

So there. With no behind-the-scenes access to the accounts themselves, all we can do is speculate. (For more stories like this, including celebrity news, beauty and fashion advice, savvy political commentary, and fascinating features, sign up for the Marie Claire newsletter.

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