Fansly is the NSFW Site Angling to Be the Next OnlyFans

For the last few years, OnlyFans has been the obvious choice for adult content creators when it comes to where they host their subscription-based work. But given the platform’s announcement that they will no longer allow explicit photos or videos come October 1st, many creators are now exploring alternative sites with similar offerings. One newer but increasingly popular choice is Fansly, which received such a deluge of new signups last week that their servers crashed. At one point, they were receiving 4,000 new sign-ups an hour.

But what sets Fansly apart from competitors? Is it actually committed to supporting sex workers, or is it only a matter of time before it goes through an OnlyFans-style purge? Here’s everything you need to know about the site, for both creators and customers.

What is Fansly?

Fansly is a free and subscription-based social media site that hosts adult content. While there are a few extra features Fansly has that OnlyFans doesn’t, the two sites are nearly identical. Even the layout is similar.

Based on Fansly’s Twitter, which was created in November 2020, the site didn’t begin growing until early 2021 when creators started to become concerned OnlyFans might ban adult content. As of August 21, 2021, the site has 2.1 million users, making it one of the more popular OnlyFans alternatives.

Who owns Fansly?

Fansly is owned by Baltimore-based company Select Media LLC and CY Media LTD in Kamares, Cyprus. Incorporation reports list Michael Etelis as the owner of each, with the LLC established in February 2020 and the LTD established in May 2021. There’s not much information about Etelis out there, except that he’s registered eight different companies in Maryland and Texas since 2016, most of which appear to be associated with online media.

Who is using Fansly?

Currently, interest in Fansly has been trending higher than OnlyFans’ other competitors like JustForFans or AVNStars. On the subreddit r/OnlyFansAdvice, hundreds of users have been sharing their Fansly links and encouraging creators to follow and promote each other’s content.

Many creators have been pursuing Fansly since well before the OnlyFans announcement, though. A quick search on Twitter yields tons of results for performers promoting their work and links, ranging from Dominatrix PAWGs to cosplaying femboys to classic girl/boy-next-door types, many of whom will no longer be able to share their content on OnlyFans. With exceptions for things like illegal activity, violence and racism, Fansly’s terms of service appear to allow for fetish content like hypnosis that other sites prohibit. Whatever your type, you can probably find it on Fansly.

There are also plenty of already-famous creators using Fansly, too. Amouranth, a popular Twitch streamer, is one major creator who has been using Fansly for months, building a following of over 215,000 subscribers. Naked Bakers is another major creator who has turned to Fansly, citing their acceptance of public flashing and pee videos as part of her reasoning for joining the platform.

When logged in to Fansly, there’s also a prominent “suggestions” feature that points you toward other popular verified creators. There is a search function as well, though currently, you can only look people up by username. In terms of discovering new creators, Fansly is about equal to OnlyFans.

How much does it cost, and how much are creators earning?

Like OnlyFans, creators determine their own prices to charge for subscriptions on Fansly. But one unique feature is that creators can offer a variety of subscription tiers. Most creators allow fans to follow them for free, giving access to selfies and censored content. Creators can even use emojis to censor specific parts of a photo for free followers, then have the emoji disappear for paid subscribers. With all that in mind, there’s a huge range of costs and earnings for both customers and creators.

For their main paid tier, most creators appear to charge between $5 and $15 per month. Many only offer one tier, though some take advantage of the opportunity to have multiple. Amouranth, for example, currently charges $9.70 for her primary tier, but offers “Diamond” and “VIP” tiers for $100 and $200 a month. On these tiers, Amouranth appears to offer much longer videos, averaging 15 minutes and up.

Fansly takes 20 percent of all subscription and pay-per-view earnings, and their application page says their top creators make over $10,000 per month. With the same payout percentage as OnlyFans, creators have the opportunity to make as much on Fansly as they did on OnlyFans.

What are people saying about Fansly?

The response to Fansly has been positive so far, with tons of performers tweeting about how they plan to join the site (or have already). As @NerdySadiexxx tweeted, “I love being able to geo-block specific cities instead of the entire state, being able to set up a paid/free page in one and the tiered subscriptions! I’m really excited for the switch to Fansly!”

On Reddit, many have discussed how they enjoy the option to create tiers of subscribers and other features, but some have also expressed hesitancy about the platform, too. In one thread polling r/OnlyFansAdvice members about where they’d be joining next, one creator posted the following list of Fansly cons:

 Why you SHOULDN’T JOIN FANSLY

– Is an LLC (easy to get, not a real business. Literally anyone can sign up for one).

– NOT RUN BY SEX WORKERS

– Has no information about themselves anywhere on their website

– Is run by less than a handful of men who will be profiting off of sex workers, and guarantee unable to handle all the new performers.

The last point is difficult to verify, and their capacity to handle the deluge of new performers remains to be seen. But at any rate, Fansly doesn’t appear to be a picture-perfect OnlyFans alternative, and many creators’ opinions seem to reflect that.

What is Fansly doing to avoid the same issues of OnlyFans?

Currently, one problem with Fansly is that it only allows users to pay using a credit card. Without additional payment options like crypto, Fansly might be susceptible to disruptions in the event that Visa and Mastercard decide to pull out of the platform as they did Pornhub and are allegedly leading OnlyFans to remove adult content. It’s unclear if or what they’re doing to prevent this, though their support team has stated they plan on implementing crypto for both subscribers and creators. At very least, Fansly openly promotes itself as a platform for sex workers on Twitter.

What’s the bottom line?

Given the increasing interest in Fansly, it’s possible that Fansly could become the next ubiquitous name in adult subscription content. With its tiered subscriptions and more targeted geo-blocking, it already beats out OnlyFans in terms of usability and offerings. But, there’s still a lot of unknowns about the platform, like how it will adapt to financial hurdles (though it appears to be committed to being a sex-worker friendly platform and has proven itself able to adapt to growing demand).

So far, it’s more than a solid alternative to OnlyFans for both creators and subscribers, but it’s not yet immune to the same issues that brought down explicit content on OnlyFans. They do, however, seem to garner some quality memes, so there’s that:

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Magdalene Taylor

Magdalene Taylor is a staff writer at MEL. She covers internet culture, sex and the online adult industry. She lives in Brooklyn but is from God's Country, Western Massachusetts.