Influencer Vrutika Patel maintains an active social media presence. On Instagram, she has more than 1 lakh followers and presents a sanitised feed. One picture shows her dressed in a blue kurta, posing in front of a bougainvillea shrub. Another shows drinking a cup of tea. Yet another picture shows her at a beach in Diu. She's tucking into a plate of pasta in one post.
In short, she is like any other lifestyle or fashion influencer. But there’s just one catch — Vrutika Patel is not real.
Vrutika’s profile is part of the recent crop of “AI influencers” taking over social media. Although the first AI influencers date back to the mid-2010s, the real boom in this fake creator economy happened more recently with the rise of powerful AI models.
What is an AI influencer?
According to Influencer Marketing Hub, AI influencer are “digital characters or avatars given a personality by their creators and made to act and look like any normal influencer would.”
{{/usCountry}}According to Influencer Marketing Hub, AI influencer are “digital characters or avatars given a personality by their creators and made to act and look like any normal influencer would.”
{{/usCountry}}Today, thousands of such ‘fake’ influencer profiles proliferate on social media. At first glance, they can be hard to distinguish from real people, thanks to AI’s ability to generate extremely realistic pictures and videos. Look a little closer, however, and you’ll notice the signs — skin that is a little too smooth, photos that are a little too polished.
(Also read: Who is Mia Zelu? AI influencer fakes Wimbledon appearance, fools internet)
Vrutika Patel’s earnings
Vrutika Patel is just a small part of the burgeoning AI creators economy, but her Instagram profile provides interesting insights into how much the people behind such AI models can earn.
A February 2026 piece in the Business of Fashion magazine noted how fake influencers can generate real cash through affiliate links, brand collaborations and subscription models. In Vrutika’s case, she has 300 subscribers on Instagram.
Each subscriber pays a fee of ₹399 per month, which brings ‘her’ total monthly earnings to ₹1,19,700. This does not include money earned through brand collaborations and other channels.
In short, the humans behind Vrutika Patel’s AI-generated persona are earning over ₹1.1 lakh per month.
(Also read: AI model's shayari fools millions of viewers, video gets 28 million views. It was copied from…)
The earning potential of AI creators became a topic of discussion after an X user posted about Vrutika Patel’s subscribers. The post sparked a discussion on morality.
“Now some people will blame AI to ruin our society/cultural values but no one will look at the common denominator who gives rise to such things - men!” wrote one X user.
“ow i am very much convinced that these accounts run by some shady people to funnel black money and convert it into white through subscribers,” another said.