If you are a creator in 2026, you have probably asked yourself at least one of these.
Why does promotion feel less predictable than it used to.
Why are subscribers quicker to churn, even when the content is solid.
Why does the inbox feel like a second full time job.
And why are “fan sites” suddenly being discussed in the same breath as major private equity deals.
This is not just a vibes shift. It is structural.
In January 2026, Reuters reported that OnlyFans was in exclusive talks to sell a nearly 60 percent stake to Architect Capital, valuing the business at about $5.5 billion including debt. That one report captured something the industry has been living for a while: fan subscription platforms are no longer a weird corner of the internet. They are a real category with real money, and that changes the rules for everyone.
To get inside what is happening on the ground, I spoke with Sandro Schulz, founder of Laguna Studios, an OnlyFans management agency that works with creators on growth, operations, and monetization systems. Laguna Studios describes Schulz as the driving force behind its strategy, focused on repeatable, sustainable performance rather than short term hype.
What follows is a journalist’s look at the state of fan sites in 2026, where the industry is heading, and why OnlyFans chatting services have become one of the most important, and most misunderstood, parts of the business.
The 2026 scorecard: scale is up, expectations are up, pressure is up
The fastest way to understand 2026 is to look at what the public numbers are telling us.
Financial Times reported that OnlyFans had 4.6 million creator accounts by the end of 2024, up 13 percent, and 377.5 million fan accounts, up nearly 25 percent, with subscriber revenue of $7.2 billion in 2024 and $5.8 billion paid out to creators. Variety also reported the $7.22 billion gross figure for fiscal 2024 and framed it as year over year growth.
Those numbers do not just signal growth. They signal density. More creators, more content, more choice, and a fanbase that is now trained to compare experiences.
“The biggest shift is that the market is educated now,” Schulz told me. “Fans have seen everything. They know what a good page feels like, and they know what a lazy page feels like. In the early days you could brute force it. In 2026, brute force burns people out before it builds anything stable.”
Fan sites are not a single platform anymore, they are a stack
OnlyFans still anchors the category, but the ecosystem around it has matured into what operators talk about as a stack. The platform is the storefront. The business is everything behind it.
Schulz put it plainly. “Creators keep thinking the platform is the business. It is not. The business is the machine behind the page. Content planning, promo pipeline, retention, chat, offer structure, safety. When that machine is clean, you can win on almost any platform.”
That machine matters more now because creators are increasingly platform curious. Some are experimenting with newer platforms that promise less burnout, better discovery, or different content rules. That “burnout narrative” has become loud enough that it is now a product pitch.
In November 2025, The Guardian profiled Stella Barey’s adult platform, Hidden, explicitly positioning it as a response to the unsustainable grind many creators associate with the classic OnlyFans model. Whether Hidden becomes a major player is almost beside the point. The trend is clear: the next generation of platforms are selling relief from creator exhaustion.
The real story of 2026 is creator burnout meeting professionalization
There is a tension at the heart of 2026.
On one hand, there is more money in the ecosystem and more mainstream interest. On the other hand, creators feel like they are working harder for the same results.
That tension is what pushes professionalization. Agencies, editors, chat teams, content protection, analytics, and workflow tools are no longer niche. For many high earning creators, they are the standard.
“The creator who tries to do everything alone eventually hits a wall,” Schulz said. “And it is not because they are not talented. It is because the job is too wide. You are a media company, a marketer, a customer service desk, and a brand, all at once. That is not a one person role at scale.”
Laguna Studios’ own positioning reflects that framing, focusing on systems that let creators focus on being the face of the brand while the operation runs consistently behind them.
The inbox became the battlefield, not the feed
Here is the part most casual observers miss.
In 2026, the feed gets you noticed. The inbox keeps you paid.
That is why OnlyFans chatting services have exploded in relevance. They sit right at the intersection of revenue, retention, and creator sanity.
Laguna Studios publishes openly about this, arguing that chatting is not “extra,” it is the engine, and framing it as a lever for PPV sales, retention stability, and brand protection.
Schulz’s view is practical, not philosophical.
“People want to debate chat like it is a morality play,” he told me. “But the operational reality is simple. At volume, if you do not build support, you either burn out or you drop revenue and churn fans. Neither is a good outcome.”
What creators get wrong about chatting services
There are two different conversations that get mashed together online.
One conversation is about scale and support.
The other conversation is about deception and trust.
Schulz draws a hard line between good operations and bad behavior.
“Bad chat feels like a script, pushes too hard, and breaks the vibe of the creator,” he said. “Good chat feels like the creator’s voice, respects boundaries, and makes the fan experience better. It is closer to concierge than it is to spam.”
That distinction matters because trust is the real currency of subscriptions. Fans renew when the experience feels consistent and personal, even if the creator is not personally typing every message.
The key word is consistency. If a page is warm one day and robotic the next, fans feel it instantly.
This is why agencies that run chat at scale talk obsessively about voice, boundaries, and standards, not just conversion rate.
What evolves next: the 2026 to 2029 trajectory
Based on current reporting, platform behavior, and the direction of creator operations, four evolutions look likely.
1) The portable creator brand becomes the main asset
Creators will increasingly treat platforms as channels, not as identity. That means building audiences that can move, through email lists, community spaces, collab networks, and content lanes that travel across platforms.
Schulz said it in a way that felt almost uncomfortable. “If your entire business exists inside one app, you do not own a business. You rent one. Creators need owned infrastructure, even if it is simple. Something they control.”
2) Retention becomes the primary competitive edge
Subscriber spikes are loud, but renewals are quiet and profitable. Pages that build onboarding flows, consistent messaging, and a clear reason to stay will separate from pages that rely on constant churn.
Laguna Studios has been publishing about LTV as the metric that changes everything, because high LTV buys time, boundaries, and stability.
3) Chat becomes a professional discipline
In 2026, chat is evolving into customer experience. That means faster response times, cleaner segmentation, smarter mass messaging, and fewer awkward random asks.
Laguna Studios’ guide emphasizes that mass messages and chat are not about sending more, they are about sending the right message to the right people at the right time, without burning trust.
Schulz echoed the same idea in plain English. “Every message trains your audience. You are teaching them what to expect from you. Most creators do not realize they are training fans to ignore them.”
4) Compliance and payments stay central
The Reuters sale talks story included a line that should not be overlooked: Architect Capital’s interest was framed around building financial infrastructure for “under banked” content creators, pointing directly at the long running friction between adult adjacent platforms and financial services.
Translation: the money is big, but the plumbing still matters, and it will shape what platforms can do next.
A quick field note from Laguna Studios: what actually moves the needle
Journalists love sweeping statements. Operators love specifics.
So I asked Schulz what change reliably improves outcomes, without touching anything controversial.
He went straight to structure.
“The creators who stabilize fastest are the ones who stop improvising,” he said. “They plan content, they plan promo, they plan offers, they have an inbox system. Most plateaus are not about talent. They are about chaos.”
Laguna Studios has written about this exact shift in its 2026 promo playbook, arguing that promotion is a pipeline problem, not a platform problem.
That might sound unsexy, but it is the point. The next era is being built by people willing to do the boring work consistently.
Where this leaves creators in 2026
The fan site industry in 2026 is not dying. It is maturing.
And maturity is uncomfortable. It forces creators to answer questions they could avoid in earlier years.
What is your niche, really.
What is your value promise beyond content volume.
What does a fan experience look like on your page, from day one to month six.
And what happens when you stop being able to personally do every job inside the business.
Schulz ended with a line that stuck with me.
“Creators do not lose because they are not hot enough or not interesting enough,” he said. “They lose because they never build a system. And the moment the market gets competitive, systems beat effort.”
That might be the most 2026 takeaway of all.
