Mike Krieger

Mike Krieger
Born	Michel Krieger 4 3, 1986
Birthplace	São Paulo, Brazil
Nationality	Brazilian-American
Occupation	Software engineer, entrepreneur
Known for	Co-founder of Instagram
Education	Stanford University (BS, MS)
Awards	TIME100 AI (2025)

Michel "Mike" Krieger (born March 4, 1986) is a Brazilian-American software engineer and entrepreneur who co-founded Instagram, the photo- and video-sharing social network, alongside Kevin Systrom in 2010. As Instagram's chief technology officer (CTO), Krieger oversaw the platform's technical architecture as it scaled from a small startup to a global service with over one billion monthly active users before its acquisition by Facebook and his subsequent departure in 2018. Following Instagram, Krieger partnered again with Systrom to build Rt.live, a COVID-19 data tracker, and later Artifact, an AI-powered news application. Since 2024, Krieger has held a senior product role at Anthropic, the artificial intelligence safety and research company, where he has contributed to the development of AI products built on Anthropic's Claude model. In 2025, TIME magazine named Krieger to its TIME100 AI list of the most influential people in artificial intelligence. His career trajectory—from building one of the world's most-used consumer applications to working at the frontier of AI development—has positioned him as a significant figure in Silicon Valley's technology landscape.

Early Life

Mike Krieger was born Michel Krieger on March 4, 1986, in São Paulo, Brazil. He grew up in São Paulo, one of the largest cities in Latin America, before eventually relocating to the United States to pursue higher education. Details about Krieger's family background and childhood in Brazil remain limited in publicly available sources, though his upbringing in a major metropolitan center with a growing technology sector informed his later interest in software engineering and user-facing technology products.

Krieger's move from Brazil to the United States for university studies at Stanford University marked a pivotal transition in his life. The Bay Area environment, with its dense network of technology companies, venture capital firms, and entrepreneurial culture, provided fertile ground for his ambitions in software development and product design. His experiences as an immigrant and Portuguese speaker also later influenced aspects of Instagram's early international growth strategy, as the platform gained rapid adoption in Brazil and other countries outside the United States.

Education

Krieger attended Stanford University in Stanford, California, where he earned both a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Science degree. At Stanford, he studied symbolic systems, an interdisciplinary program that combines computer science, linguistics, philosophy, and psychology—a curriculum well-suited to someone who would go on to build user-centric software products. It was during his time at Stanford that Krieger met Kevin Systrom, who would become his co-founder at Instagram. The connections Krieger formed at Stanford and in the broader Bay Area technology community proved instrumental in launching Instagram and securing early support for the venture.

Career

Instagram

In 2010, Krieger co-founded Instagram with Kevin Systrom. The application launched on Apple's iOS platform in October 2010 as a mobile photo-sharing service that allowed users to apply filters to photographs and share them on a social feed. Krieger served as Instagram's chief technology officer, responsible for the platform's engineering infrastructure, mobile application development, and technical scaling.

Instagram's growth was rapid. The application attracted millions of users within its first year and became one of the fastest-growing social media platforms in history. Krieger's engineering leadership was central to managing the technical challenges associated with such swift expansion, including scaling server infrastructure, optimizing mobile performance, and maintaining reliability as user demand surged. The platform's clean, intuitive interface and its emphasis on visual content distinguished it from other social networks at the time.

The Bay Area connections that both Krieger and Systrom had cultivated—through Stanford and the broader Silicon Valley ecosystem—played a role in Instagram's early trajectory. The startup attracted attention from prominent investors and technology figures early in its development.

In April 2012, Facebook (now Meta Platforms) announced its acquisition of Instagram for approximately $1 billion, one of the largest acquisitions in Silicon Valley history at the time. The deal brought Instagram and its small team under Facebook's corporate umbrella, though the application continued to operate as a distinct product with its own brand identity.

Following the acquisition, Krieger remained at Instagram as CTO. Under his continued technical leadership, the platform expanded its feature set significantly, adding video sharing, direct messaging, Stories (ephemeral content), and various other capabilities that broadened its appeal and deepened user engagement. Instagram also launched on the Android platform, opening the service to a much larger global audience. During Krieger's tenure as CTO, Instagram's user base grew from a few million to over one billion monthly active users, a milestone the platform reached in 2018.

Krieger's prominence as a technology leader was recognized during this period. In January 2012, he was among the guests seated with First Lady Michelle Obama at the State of the Union address, an honor that reflected Instagram's cultural significance even in its early years.

In September 2018, both Krieger and Systrom resigned from their positions at Instagram. Their departure came amid reported tensions with Facebook's leadership over the direction of Instagram and the degree of independence the platform would retain within the larger company. Their appearance at the South by Southwest (SXSW) conference in March 2019 was their first major public appearance following their resignations, where they discussed Instagram's history and their experiences building the platform.

Rt.live

Following their departure from Instagram, Krieger and Systrom turned their attention to new projects. In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pair launched Rt.live, a website that tracked the real-time effective reproduction number (Rt) of COVID-19 across all 50 U.S. states. The tool provided a data-driven way for the public and policymakers to understand how quickly the virus was spreading in different regions. Rt.live reflected Krieger's continued interest in building data-informed, publicly accessible tools and demonstrated the co-founders' ability to quickly develop and deploy technology products in response to urgent societal needs.

Artifact

In 2023, Krieger and Systrom launched Artifact, an AI-powered personalized news application. Artifact used machine learning algorithms to curate news articles for individual users based on their reading habits and interests. The app was described as applying artificial intelligence to the news reading experience in a manner analogous to how TikTok's algorithm personalized video recommendations.

Artifact initially launched in a limited beta before being opened to the general public in February 2023. The app garnered attention both for the involvement of the Instagram co-founders and for its use of AI in content curation, arriving at a moment of heightened public interest in artificial intelligence applications.

However, in January 2024, Systrom announced that Artifact would be shutting down. The decision was attributed to the conclusion that the market opportunity for a standalone AI news app was insufficient to justify continued development, despite the product's positive reception among its users.

Anthropic

In 2024, Krieger joined Anthropic, an AI safety and research company, as its chief product officer (CPO). At Anthropic, he took responsibility for the product strategy and development of consumer- and developer-facing products built on the company's Claude AI model. His appointment was seen as a significant hire for Anthropic, bringing deep consumer product expertise to a company that had primarily been known for its research contributions to AI safety.

At Anthropic, Krieger played a central role in building out the company's product organization and shaping how Claude was delivered to end users and enterprise customers. In a 2025 interview with The New York Times on the Hard Fork podcast, Krieger discussed the experience of building products at Anthropic and the broader implications of AI development for the technology industry and employment.

In 2025, Anthropic announced a restructuring of its leadership team. Krieger transitioned from his role as chief product officer to lead Anthropic Labs, an internal incubator focused on developing new products and applications. In this capacity, Krieger described the evolving capabilities of Claude, noting that the AI model was increasingly contributing to its own development—a claim that he stated validated predictions made by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei about the trajectory of AI advancement.

Krieger also participated in industry events during this period, including the Cerebral Valley AI Summit in San Francisco, where he spoke alongside other AI leaders.

Personal Life

Krieger married Kaitlyn Trigger in a ceremony that was documented in W magazine. The couple has been involved in philanthropic activities, including a co-funding partnership with GiveWell, a nonprofit organization that evaluates and directs funding to effective charities. In 2015, Krieger and Trigger established a co-funding arrangement with GiveWell to support its recommended charities.

Krieger and Trigger have also been supporters of the arts. In 2021, the couple made a $1 million gift to the new Institute of Contemporary Art San Francisco, contributing to the establishment of the institution in the city where they reside. Their philanthropic work spans both effective altruism–aligned giving and cultural patronage.

Recognition

Krieger has received recognition throughout his career for his contributions to technology and entrepreneurship. In 2011, he and Systrom were named to Inc. magazine's "30 Under 30" list in recognition of Instagram's rapid growth and cultural impact.

In January 2012, Krieger was invited to attend the State of the Union address as a guest of First Lady Michelle Obama, seated alongside other notable figures including Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Steve Jobs. The invitation reflected both Instagram's commercial success and its broader cultural significance as a platform that was changing how people shared visual media.

In August 2025, TIME magazine named Krieger to its TIME100 AI list, recognizing him as one of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence. The recognition cited his career arc from co-founding Instagram to his role at Anthropic, where he was contributing to the development and deployment of AI systems.

Instagram itself has been recognized as one of the most influential social media platforms ever created, with Encyclopædia Britannica describing it as a major online social media platform and social network service for photograph and video sharing.

Legacy

Mike Krieger's career is defined by the creation and scaling of Instagram, which fundamentally altered how people create, share, and consume visual media. Instagram introduced photographic filters and a mobile-first social experience to a mainstream audience, popularizing concepts such as the social media "story" format and influencing the development of visual culture on the internet. The platform's growth to over one billion monthly active users during Krieger's tenure as CTO represented one of the most significant scaling achievements in the history of consumer technology.

Beyond Instagram's commercial success, the platform had measurable effects on industries including advertising, photography, journalism, and retail, giving rise to the "influencer economy" and changing how brands communicate with consumers. Krieger's role as the technical architect behind this transformation—building the infrastructure that made it possible for hundreds of millions of people to share visual content in real time—is a central part of his professional legacy.

Krieger's post-Instagram work has extended his influence into the field of artificial intelligence. His transition from social media to AI safety and product development at Anthropic reflects a broader trend of experienced consumer technology leaders moving into the AI sector. His involvement in building products on top of large language models, and his public commentary on the capabilities and implications of AI systems, have contributed to ongoing discussions about the responsible development and deployment of artificial intelligence.

His philanthropic activities, particularly his engagement with effective altruism through GiveWell and his support for contemporary art institutions in San Francisco, also form part of his broader public profile.