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Instagram's most-liked post is now just an egg. Sorry, Kylie Jenner

I, for one, welcome our new embryoverlord.

Jackson Ryan Former Science Editor
Jackson Ryan was CNET's science editor, and a multiple award-winning one at that. Earlier, he'd been a scientist, but he realized he wasn't very happy sitting at a lab bench all day. Science writing, he realized, was the best job in the world -- it let him tell stories about space, the planet, climate change and the people working at the frontiers of human knowledge. He also owns a lot of ugly Christmas sweaters.
Jackson Ryan
2 min read
egg
Egg Gang/Instagram

No yolk, a photo of an egg has supplanted Kylie Jenner as the most-liked Instagram post of all time.

Originally posted on Jan. 5, 2019, by the account world_record_egg, the simple photo of an egg on a plain, white background has surpassed the 18.1 million "likes" required to steal the record from Kylie Jenner. The first photo of Jenner's newborn daughter, posted on Feb. 6, 2018, was the leader until this mysterious challenger appeared.

We give you the challenger and new king or queen of the 'gram:

The previous leader:

View this post on Instagram

stormi webster 👼🏽

A post shared by Kylie (@kyliejenner) on

On Sunday evening, Egg Gang (as the account has named itself) zoomed from 14 million likes to 18 million in under three hours, meaning it landed in the history books as Instagram's most-liked post. Kylie Jenner moves to second place after rallying another 100,000 likes as the Egg ascended to the throne. It becomes the first nonhuman in Instagram's top 20 most-liked posts, with celebrities such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Beyonce and Selena Gomez owning the lion's share of top photos.

As of 6:30 a.m. PT Monday, the egg post had 28.6 million likes, well past the now 18.3 million tally for the Jenner clan.

Now that the egg is No. 1 we finally have an answer to the centuries-old question: What came first?

But bigger questions persist. Why an egg? Is it an ironic nod to Jenner's original record-breaking photo about the development of life into a living, breathing creature? Is this a ploy to shed light on the plight of laying practices in the farming industry? Is it just an elaborate ploy to enable the construction of fantastic puns and headlines across the internet? 

Egg Gang didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

Watch this: What is Instagram's IGTV?

First published Jan. 13 at 2:58 p.m. PT.
Update at 4:52 p.m. PT:: Adds that Egg Gang's post is now the most-liked on Instagram.
Update Jan. 14 at 6:33 a.m. PT: Adds the latest number of likes for the Egg Gang post.

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